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A WOMAN NAMED 
SMITH 


u£,- 


BY 

MARIE CONWAY OEMLER 

Author of “SLirpy McGee,” etc. 



NEW YORK 
THE CENTURY CO. 
1921 



Copyright, 1919, by 
The Centuky Co. 


Published, September, 1919 






i.-* 


To 

ELIZABETH HEYWARD OEMLER 
Sometimes my Little Girl. 


When you were yet an Awful Baby, 

And bawled o’ bed-time, I said “ Maybe 
It is not best to spank or scold her: 
Suppose a fairy-tale were told her ? ” 

And gave you then, to my undoing, 

The wolf Red Riding-Hood pursuing; 

Sang Mother Goose her artless rhyming; 
Showed Jack the Magic Beanstalk climbing; 
Three Little Pigs were so appealing, 

You set up sympathetic squealing! 

Then, Bitsybet, you had your mother — 

You bawled until 1 told another! 

The Awful. Baby’s gone. Here lately 
You bear your little self sedately. 

You’ve shed your rompers; you want dresses 
Prinked out with frillies; fluff your tresses; 
Delight your daddy, aunts, and mother; 

And sisterly set straight your brother. 

Your bib-and-tucker days abolished, 

Your manners and your nails are . polished. 
One baby trait remains, thank glory! 
You’re still a glutton for a story. 

Still, Bitsybet, you beg another: 

So here’s one for you from 

YOUR MOTHER. 











































CONTENTS 


CHAPTER PAG® 

I The Scarlet Witch Departs ... 3 

II And Ariel Makes Music 12 

III The Dear Little God ! 33 

IV The Hyndses op Hynds House ... 53 

V “Thy Neighbor as Thyself” ... 79 

VI Glamoury 105 

VII A Bright Particular Star .... 122 

VIII Peacocks and Ivory 146 

IX The Judgment of Spring .... 164 

X The Forest of Arden 177 

XI The Jinnee Intervenes 199 

XII Man Proposes 215 

XIII Fires of Yesterday 234 

XIV The Talisman 248 

XV The Heart of Hynds House . . . 260 

XVI The Devill His Rainbow .... 274 
XVII On the Knees of the Gods .... 294 

XVIII The Greatest Gift 316 

XIX Deep Waters 336 

XX Harbor 353 



A WOMAN NAMED 
SMITH 


CHARACTERS 


Sophy : A woman named Smith. 

Alicia Gaines : Flower o’ the Peach. 

Nicholas Jelnik: Peacocks aAid Ivory. 
Doctor Richard Geddes: Cwur-de-Lion. 

The Author: Himself. 

The Secretary : A Pleasant Person. 

Miss Emmeline Phelps-Parsons : of Boston , 
Massachusetts. 

Miss Martha Hopkins: (C Clothed in White 
Samite.” 

Judge Gatchell: The Law. 

Schmetz AND Riedriech : Workmen and Vi- 
sionaries. 

The Jinnee: A Son of the Prophet. 
Sophronisba Scarlett : “ The Scarlett Witch.” 
The Hyndses of Hynds House. 

Paying Guests. 

The People of Hyndsville, South Carolina. 
Mary Magdalen: Queen-of-Sheeba ; Fernolia: 

Important Persoyis. 

Boris: A Russian Wolfhound. 

The Black Family : A Witch’s Cat’s Kittens. 
Beautiful Dog : Last but not Least. 






/ 






















“Sophy,” he said, “I have found the lost key of Hynds House” 


A WOMAN NAMED 
SMITH 


CHAPTER I 

THE SCARLETT WITCH DEPARTS 

I F it had been humanly possible for Great- 
Aunt Sophronisba Scarlett to lug her place 
in Hyndsville, South Carolina, along with her 
into the next world, plump it squarely in the 
middle of the Elysian Fields, plaster it over with 
“No Trespassing ” signs, and then settle herself 
down to a blissful eternity of serving writs upon 
the angels for flying over her fences without per- 
mission, and setting the saved by the ears in gen- 
eral, she would have done so and felt that heaven 
was almost as desirable a place as South Caro- 
lina. But as even she could n’t impose her will 
upon the next world, and there was nobody in 
this one she hated less than she did me — pos- 
sibly because she had never laid eyes on me — 
she willed me Hynds House and what was left of 


4 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


the Hynds fortune ; tying this string to her b. - 
quest: I must occupy Hynds House within six 
months, and I could n’t rent it, or attempt to sell 
it, without forfeiture of the entire estate. 

I can fancy the ancient beldam sniggering sar- 
donically the while she figured to herself the 
chagrined astonishment, the helpless wrath, of 
her watchfully waiting neighbors, when they 
should discover that historic Hynds House, 
dating from the beginning of things Carolinian, 
had passed into the unpedigreed hands of a 
woman named Smith. I can fancy her balefully 
exact perception of the attitude so radically con- 
servative a community must needs assume to- 
ward such an intruder as myself, foisted upon it, 
so to speak, by an enemy who never failed to turn 
the trick. 

Because I ’m not a Hynds, at all. Great Aunt 
Sophronisba was my aunt not by blood but 
by marriage; she having, when she was no 
longer what is known as a spring chicken, met 
my Great-Uncle Johnny Scarlett and scan- 
dalized all Hyndsville by marrying him out of 
hand. 

I have heard that she was insanely in love with 
him, and I believe it; nothing short of an over- 
mastering passion could have induced one of the 
haughty Hyndses to marry a person with such 
family connections as his. For my father, 


THE SCAELET WITCH DEPAETS 


5 


George Smith, was a ruddy English ship-chandler 
who pitched upon Boston for a home, and lived 
with his family in the rooms above his shop ; and 
my grandmother Smith dropped her “ aitches ” 
with the cheerful ease of one to the manner born, 
bless her stout old Cockney heart ! I can remem- 
ber her hearing me my spelling-lesson of a night, 
her spectacles far down on her old button of a 
nose, her white curls bobbing from under her cap. 

“ What ! Carn’t spell ‘saloon’? Listen, 
then, Miss : There ’s a hess and a hay and a hell 
and two hoes and a henn ! Now, then, d ’ye spell 
it!” 

Not that Mrs. Johnny ever accepted us. It 
was borne in upon the Smiths that undesirable in- 
laws are outlaws. This despite the fact that my 
mother’s pink-and- white English face was a 
gentler copy of what her uncle’s had been in his 
youth; and that when I came along, some years 
after the dear old man’s death, I was named 
Sophronisba at Mrs. Johnny’s urgent request. 

After Great-Uncle Johnny died, as if the last 
tie which bound her to ordinary humanity had 
snapped, his widow retired into a seclusion from 
which she emerged only to sue somebody. She 
said the world was being turned topsyturvy by 
people who were allowed to misbehave to their 
betters, and who needed to be taught a lesson and 
their proper place; and that so long as she re- 


6 A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 

tained her faculties, she would do her duty in 
that respect, please God ! 

She did her duty so well in that respect that 
the Hynds fortune, which even civil war and re- 
construction had n’t been able altogether to 
wreck, dwindled to a mere fifteen thousand dol- 
lars; and she was n’t on speaking terms with any- 
body but Judge Gatchell, her lawyer. She 
would have quarreled with him, too, had she 
dared. 

To the minister, who bearded her for her soul's 
sake every now and then, she spoke in words 
brief and curt : 

“You here again? Wanted to see me, hey? 
Well, you ’ve done it. Now get out ! ” 

And in the meantime the years passed and my 
own immediate family passed with them; but 
still the gaunt old woman lived on in her gaunt 
old house, becoming in time a myth to me, and 
to Hyndsville as well; where they referred to 
her, succinctly, as “ the Scarlet Witch.” I heard 
from her directly only once, and that was the 
year she sent me a red flannel petticoat for a 
Christmas present. After that, as if she ’d done 
her worst, she ignored me altogether. 

My mother had wanted me to be a school- 
teacher, in her eyes the acme of respectability. 
But as it happens, there are two things I 
wouldn’t be: one’s a school-teacher, the other 


THE SCARLET WITCH DEPARTS 7 


a minister’s wife. If I liad to marry the 
average minister, I should infallibly hate all 
church-goers; if I had to teach the average 
school-child and wrestle with the average school- 
board, I should end by burning joss-sticks to 
Herod. 

So I disappointed my mother by becoming a 
typist. After her death I secured a foothold in 
a New York house — I ’d always wanted to live 
in New York — and went up, step by step, from 
what may be called a rookie in the outside office, 
to private secretary to the Head. And I ’d been 
a business woman for all of seventeen years when 
Great-Aunt Sophronisba Scarlett departed at the 
age of ninety-eight years and eleven months, and 
willed that I should take up my life in the house 
where she had dropped hers. 

“ Oh, Sophy ! ” cried Alicia Gaines, the one 
person in the world who did n’t call me Miss 
Smith. “ Oh, Sophy, it ’s like a fairy-story come 
true! Think of falling heir to an old, old, old 
lady’s old, old, old house, in South Carolina ! I 
hope there ’s a big old door with a fan-light, and 
a Greeky front with white pillars, and a big 
old hall, and a big old garden — ” 

“ And an old stove that smokes and old win- 
dows that rattle and an old roof that leaks, 
and maybe big, big old rats that squeak o’ 
nights,” I said darkly. For the first rapture of 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


the astonishing news was beginning to wear thin, 
and doubt was appearing in spots. 

“ Sophy Smith ! W T hy, if such a wonderful, 
beautiful, unexpected thing had happened to 
me — ■’ Alicia’s blue eyes misted. I have known 
her since the day she was born, next door to 
us in Boston, and she is the only person I have 
ever seen who can cry and look pretty while 
she ’s doing it; also, she can cry and laugh at the 
same time, being Irish. Some foolish people, 
who have been deceived by Alicia Gaines’s baby 
stare and complexion, have said she has n’t sense 
enough to get in out of a shower of rain. This 
is, of course, a libel. But what’s the odds, 
when every male being in sight would rush to 
her aid with an umbrella? 

After her mother’s death I fell heir to Alicia, 
who, like me, was an only child, and without 
relatives. Lately, I ’d gotten her into our filing- 
department. She didn't belong in a business 
office, she whose proper background should have 
been an adoring husband and the latest thing in 
pink-and-white babies. 

“ But somebody ’s got to think of stoves and 
roofs and rats and such, or there ’d be no living 
in any old house,” I reminded her, practically. 
“ My dear girl, don’t you realize that this thing 
isn't all beer and skittles?” 

Alicia wrinkled her white forehead. 


THE SCARLET WITCH DEPARTS 9 


“ Consider me, a hardy late-summer plant 
forced to uproot and transplant myself to a soil 
which may not in the least agree with me. Why, 
this means changing all my fixed habits, to trot 
off to live in an old house that is probably 
haunted by the cross-grained ghost of a lady 
of ninety-nine ! ” 

“ If I were a ghost, you ’d be the very last 
person on earth I ’d want to tackle, Sophy,” re- 
marked Alicia, dimpling. “ And as for that new 
soil, why, you ’ll bloom in it ! You — well, 
Sophy dear, up to now you have been root-bound ; 
you ’ve never had a chance to grow, much less 
to blossom. Now you can do both.” 

I who was confidential secretary to the Head, 
looked at the girl who was admittedly the worst 
file-clerk on record; and she looked back at me, 
nodding her bright head with young wisdom. 

“ I hope,” she said, wistfully, “ that there ’ll 
be all sorts of lovely things in your house, Sophy, 
— old mirrors, old books, old pictures, old furni- 
ture, old china. Lord send you ’ll find an attic ! 
All my life I ’ve day-dreamed of finding an 
attic that ’s been shut up and forgotten for ages 
and ages, and discovering all sorts of lovely 
things in all sorts of hiding-places. When I 
think my day-dream may come true for you, 
Sophy, it almost reconciles me to the pain of 
parting from you ; though what on earth I ’m 


10 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


to do without you, goodness only knows ! ” She 
was sitting on my bed, kimonoed, slippered, and 
braided. And now she looked at me with a 
suddenly quivering chin. 

“ Alicia,” said I, “ ever since I discovered that 
there’s no mistake about that lawyer’s letter 
— that Hynds House is unaccountably, but un- 
doubtedly mine and I ’ve got to live in it if I 
want to keep it — it has been borne in upon 
me that you are just about the worst file-clerk 
on earth. You ’re a navy-blue failure in a busi- 
ness office. Business isn’t your motif. Now, 
will you resign the job you fill execrably, and ac- 
cept one you can fill beyond all praise — come 
South with me, share half-and-half whatever 
comes, and help make that old house a happy 
home for us both? ” 

“ Don’t joke.” Her lips went white. “ Please, 
please, Sophy dear, don’t joke like that! I — 
well, I just could n’t bear it.” 

“ I never joke,” I said indignantly. “ You 
little goose, did you imagine for one minute that 
I contemplated leaving you here by yourself, any 
more than I contemplate going down there by 
myself, if I can help it? Stop to think for a 
moment, Alicia. You have been like a little sis- 
ter to me, ever since you were born. And — 
I ’m alone, except for you — and not in my first 
youth — and not beautiful — and not gifted ” 


THE SCARLET WITCH DEPARTS 11 


At that she hurled herself off my bed and 
cried upon my shoulder, with her slim arms 
around my neck. Those young arms were be- 
ginning to make me feel wistful. If things had 
been different — if I had been lovely like the 
Scarletts, instead of looking like the Smiths — 
there might have been — 

Well, I don’t look like the Scarletts; so there 
was n’t. The best I could do was to drop a kiss 
on Alicia’s forehead, where the bright young hair 
begins to break into curls. 

And that is how, neither of us having the 
faintest notion of what was in store for us, 
Alicia Gaines and I turned our backs upon New 
York and set our faces toward Hynds House. 


CHAPTER II 


AND ARIEL MAKES MUSIC 
E had wired Judge Gatehell when to ex- 



vv pect us, but the venerable negro hack- 
man who was on the lookout for us explained 
that the judge had a “ misery in the laigs ” which 
confined him to his room, and that he advised 
us to go to the hotel for a while. 

We could n't, for was n’t our own house wait- 
ing for us? A minute later we had bundled into 
the ancient hack and were bumping and splash- 
ing through unpaved streets, getting wet, gray 
glimpses of old houses in old gardens, and every 
now and then a pink crape-myrtle blushing in 
the pouring rain. Hyndsville was, it seemed, 
one of those sprawling, easy-going old Carolina 
towns that liked plenty of elbow-room and 
was n’t particular about architectural order. 
Hynds House itself was on the extreme edge 
of things. 

The hack presently stopped before a high iron 
gate in a waist-high brick wall with a spiked 
iron railing on top of it, the whole overrun with 
weeds and creepers. Of Hynds House itself one 


12 


AND ARIEL MAKES MUSIC 13 

could n’t see anything but a stack of chimneys 
above a forest of trees. 

The gate creaked and groaned on its rusty 
hinges ; then we were walking up a weedy, rain- 
soaked path where untrimmed branches slapped 
viciously at our faces, and tough brambles, like 
snares and gins, tried to catch our feet. On each 
side was a jungle. Of a sudden the path turned, 
widened into a fairly cleared space; and Hynds 
House was before us. 

We had expected a fair-sized dwelling-house 
in its garden. And there confronted us, gloom- 
ing under the gray and threatening sky that 
M seemed the only p roper and fitting canopy for it, 
what looked like a pile reared in medieval 
Europe rather than a home in America. Its 
stained brick walls, partly covered with ivy and 
lichens ; its smokeless chimneys ; its barred doors ; 
its many shuttered windows, like blind eyes — 
all appeared deliberately to thrust aside human 
habitancy. 

A residence for woman , child , and man , 

A dwelling-place , — and yet no habitation ; 

A House , — but under some prodigious ban 
Of Excommunication . 

Yet there was nothing ruinous about it, for 
the Hyndses had sought to build it as the old 


14 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


Egyptians sought to build their temples — to 
last forever, to defy time and decay. It was not 
only meant to be a place for Hyndses to be born 
and live and die in : it was a monument to Family 
Pride, a brick-and-granite symbol of place and 
power. 

The walls were of an immense thickness, the 
corners further strengthened with great blocks 
of granite. The house had but two stories, with 
an attic under its sloping roofs, but it gave an 
effect of height as well as of solidity. Behind 
it was another brick building, the lower part 
of which had been used for stables and carriage 
house, and the upper portion as quarters for 
the house slaves, in the old days. Another 
smaller building, slate-roofed and ivy covered, 
was the spring-house, with a clear, cold little 
spring still bubbling away as merrily in its gran- 
ite basin, as if all the Hyndses were not dead 
and gone. And there was a deep well, pro- 
tected by a round stone wall, w T ith a cupola-like 
roof supported by four slender pillars. And 
everything was dank and weedy and splotched 
with mildew and with mold. 

O’er all there hung a shadow and a fear 

A sense of mystery the spirit daunted , 

And said , as plain as whisper in the ear } 

The place is Haunted! 


AND ARIEL MAKES MUSIC 


15 


When we opened the great front door, above 
which was the fan-light of Alicia’s hope, just 
as the round front porch had the big pillars, a 
damp and moldy air met us. The house had 
not been opened since Sophronisba’s funeral, and 
everything — stairs, settles, tables, cabinets, pic- 
tures, the chairs backed inhospitably against the 
wall as if to prevent anybody from sitting in 
them — was covered with a shrouding pall of 
dust. 

The hall was cross-shaped, the side passage 
running between the back drawing-room and 
library on one side, and the dining-room and 
two locked rooms on the other. It was a 
nice place, that side passage, with a fireplace 
and settles ; and beautiful windows opening 
upon the tangled garden. All the down-stairs 
walls were paneled : precious woods were not so 
hard to come by when Hynds House was built. 
It was lovely, of course, but depressingly dark. 

We got one of the big windows open, and let 
some stale damp air out and some fresh damp 
air in. Then, having despatched our hackman 
for certain necessities, Alicia and I turned and 
stared at each other, another Alicia and Sophy 
staring back at us from a dim and dusty mirror 
opposite. If, at that moment, I could have heard 
the familiar buzzer at my elbow ! If I could have 
heard the good everyday New York “ Miss Smith, 


16 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


attend to this, please ” ! God wot, if I had not 
literally burned my bridges behind me — Oh, 
oh, I had! 

“ The garden around this house,” — Alicia 
spoke in a whisper — “ stretches to the end of the 
world and then laps over. It has n’t been 
trimmed since Adam and Eye moved out. But 
those crape-myrtle trees are quite the loveliest 
things left over from Paradise, and I ’m glad we 
came here to see them with our own eyes ! Brace 
up, Sophy ! We ’ll feel heaps better when w r e ’ve 
had something to eat. Aren’t you frightfully 
hungry, and does n’t a chill suspicion strike you, 
somewhere around the wishbone, that if that An- 
cient Mariner of a hackman does n’t get back soon 
we shall starve? ” 

At that moment, from somewhere — it seemed 
to us from up-stairs — a sudden flood of sweet- 
est sound poured goldenly through that sad, dim, 
dusty house, as if a blithe spirit had slipped in 
unawares and was bidding us welcome. For a 
few wonderful moments the exquisite music 
filled the dark old place and banished gloom and 
neglect and decay ; then, with a pattering 
scamper, as of the bare, rosy feet of a beloved 
and mischievous child making a rush for his crib, 
it went as suddenly as it had come. There was 
nothing to break the silence but the swishing 
downpour of the outside rain. 


AND ARIEL MAKES MUSIC 


17 


When I could speak : “ It came from up- 
stairs ! Somebody ’s playing a violin up-stairs. 
I ’m going up-stairs to find out who it is.” 

Alicia demurred : “ It may be a real person, 

Sophy ! — a real person with a real violin. But 
I ’d rather believe it ’s Ariel’s self, come out of 
those pink crape-myrtles. Don’t go up-stairs, 
please, Sophy ! ” 

“ Nonsense! ” said I. “ Somebody ’s played a 
violin and I mean to know who he is ! ” 

And up-stairs I went, into a huge dark hall, 
with the cross-passage cutting it, and closed 
doors everywhere. At the front end was a most 
beautiful window, opening doorlike upon a tiny 
iron bird-cage of a balcony, hung up Southern 
fashion under the roof of the pillared front porch. 
At the rear a more ordinary door opened upon 
the broad veranda that ran the full width of 
the house. Both door and window were closed, 
and bolted on the inside, and the big, dark, dusty 
rooms which I resolutely entered were quite 
empty, their fireplaces boarded up, their windows 
close-shuttered. There was no sign anywhere of 
violin or player. I went down-stairs just as wise 
as I had gone up. 

“ I told you it was Ariel ! ” Alicia stood by the 
open window — our windows are sunk into the 
walls, and cased with solid black' walnut as 
impervious to decay as the granite itself — 


18 A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 

and leaned out to the wet and dripping gar- 
den. 

“ Sophy,” said she, in her high, sweet voice 
that carries like a thrush’s. “ Sophy, the best 
thing about this world is, that the best things 
in it are n’t really real. This is one of its en- 
chanted places. Sycorax used to live in this 
house: that’s what you feel about it yet. But 
now she ’s gone, her spell is lifting, and Hynds 
House is going to come alive and be young 
again ! ” 

“ At least,” I grumbled, “ admit that the dust 
inside and the rain outside and the weeds and 
mud are real ; and I ’m really hungry ! ” 

a Me too ! ” Alicia assented instantly and un- 
grammatically. “ Oh, for a square meal ! ” She 
thrust her charming head out far enough for 
the rain to splatter on her bright hair and whip 
it into curls, and bring a deeper shade of pink 
to her cheeks, and a deeper blue to her 
eyes. “ Ariel ! ” she fluted, “ Spirit of the Vio- 
lin, I’m hungry — earthily, worm-of-the-dustly, 
unromantically hungry! Send us something to 
eat.” 

“ Why don’t you rap on one of the tables,” 
I suggested ironically, “ and call up your high 
spirits to do your bidding? ” 

“ My high spirits won’t be above making you a 
soothing cup of coffee just as soon as that ancient 


AND AEIEL MAKES MUSIC 19 

African returns. In the meantime, let’s look 
around us.” 

People had forests to draw from when they 
built rooms like those in Hynds House. There 
were eight of them on the first floor. On one 
side the two drawing-rooms, the library, and 
behind that a room evidently used for an office. 
We did n’t know it then, of course, but that 
library was treasure trove. Almost every book 
and pamphlet covering the early American set- 
tlements, that is of any value at all, is in Hynds 
House library ; we have some pamphlets that even 
the British Museum lacks. 

The rooms had enough furniture to stock half 
a dozen antique-shops, all of it in a shocking 
state, the brocades in tatters, the carvings caked 
with dust. You could n’t see yourself in the tar- 
nished mirrors, the portaits were black with 
dirt, and most of the prints were badly stained. 
Alicia swooped upon a pair of china dogs with 
mauve eyes and black spots and sloppy red 
tongues, on a what-not in a corner. She said 
she had been aching for a china dog ever since 
she was born. 

“ Oh, Sophy ! ” cried she, dancing, “ was n’t 
it heavenly of that old soul to die and leave 
you two whole china dogs ! I would n’t want 
sure-enough dogs that looked like these, but as 
china dogs they ’re perfect ! And cast your eyes 


20 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


about you, Sophy! Have you ever in all your 
life seen a house that needed so much done to it 
as this house does? 

“ ‘ If seven maids with seven mops, 

Swept it for half a year, 

Do you suppose/ the Walrus said, 

‘ That that would make it clear ? 1 
‘I doubt it/ said the Carpenter, 

* And — ’ 

“ Sophy ! I shall clean some of these windows 
myself. Did you know that Queen Victoria, 
when she was a child, had the same virtuous 
inclination? Well, she had, and you see how she 
turned out ! ” 

“ I don’t believe it ! ” 

“ Don’t be skeptical ! — Look at that pink mus- 
tache-cup over there on that little table ! Who do 
you suppose had a mustache and drank out of that 
cup? It couldn’t have been Sophronisba her- 
self? I insist that it was a black-mustached 
Confederate with a red sash around his waist. 
I adore Confederates! They’re the most gla- 
morous, romantic figures in American history. 
I wish a black mustache went along with the 
cup and the house; don’t you? It would make 
things so much more interesting ! ” And she 
began to sing, at the top of her voice, in the sad 
and faded room that had n’t heard a singing 
voice these many, many years: 


AND ARIEL MAKES MUSIC 


21 


“‘Arrah, Missis McGraw,’ the Captain said, 

‘Will ye make a sojer av your son Ted? 

Wid a g-r-rand mus-tache, an’ a three-eocked hat, 
Wisha, Missis McGraw, wouldn’t you like that! 

You like that — tooroo looroo loo! 

Wisha , Missis McGraw , wouldn’t you like that!’” 

If Great-Aunt Sophronisba’s ghost, and the 
scandalized ghosts of all the haughy Hyndses 
ever intended to walk, now was the accepted 
time! And as if that graceless ballad were the 
signal for something to happen, upon the hall 
window-shutter sounded three loud, imperative 
knocks. 

Alicia dashed down the hall. 

“ Sophy ! ” she called, breathlessly, “ Sophy ! ” 

Framed in the open window, with the dripping 
trees and the slanting rain behind him, was the 
bizarre, the astounding figure of a gnomelike 
negro in a terra-cotta robe fastened about the 
waist with a girdle made of a twisted black 
shawl with the most beautiful Persian border and 
fringe. A striped silk scarf was bound turban- 
wise about his head, from which tufts of snowy 
wool protruded. From his ears hung crescent- 
shaped silver ear-rings studded with coral and 
turquoise; a necklace of the same barbaric mag- 
nificence was about his neck, and his arms were 
covered with bracelets. His deep-set eyes, his 
flat nose, his mouth set in a thousand fine 


22 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


wrinkles, the whole aspect of him, breathed a 
sly and impish drollery. He glanced from Alicia 
to me with the smiling malice of a jinnee de- 
lighted to mystify mortals. Then with a rapid 
movement he shifted the umbrella he carried over 
a large linen-covered tray, eased the latter upon 
the deep window-ledge, and beckoned with a very 
black and beringed hand. 

“ For us? ” breathed Alicia. 

With a fine flourish he swept aside the linen 
covering. And there was golden-brown chicken, 
white rice, cream gravy, hot hiscuit, cool sliced 
tomatoes with sprigs of green parsley, fresh but- 
ter, fresh cream, a great slab of heavenly cake, 
a wicker basket of Elberta peaches, rain-cooled, 
odorous, delicious, and a pot of steaming coffee. 
On the edge of the tray was a cluster of rain- 
washed roses. 

“ No,” Alicia doubted, “ this is not true: it 
can’t be ! — Sophy, do you see it, too? ” 

He motioned her to take the tray ; and his ear- 
rings swung, and all his bracelets set up a silver 
tinkling. An automobile honked outside in the 
street shut off by our garden trees, and a dog 
barked. Our jinnee cocked a cautious head and 
a listening ear, thrust the tray upon Alicia, and 
with inconceivable swiftness vanished around a 
corner. 

u Let ’s hurry and eat it before it, too, takes 


AND ARIEL MAKES MUSIC 


23 


to its heels,” said Alicia, practically. Without 
further ado we dragged forward a small table, 
and fell to. Aladdin probably tasted fare like 
that, the first time he rubbed the magic lamp. 

When we had polished the last chicken bone, 
and had that comfortable feeling that nothing 
can give so thoroughly as a good meal, Alicia 
carefully examined the china and silver. 

“ Old blue-and-white English china ; English 
silver initialed ‘ R.H.G.’ Sophy, handle this 
prayerfully: it’s an apostle spoon. Think of 
having a jinnee fetch you your coffee, and of stir- 
ring it with an apostle spoon.” 

She spoke reverently. Alicia is the sort who 
flattens her nose against antique-shop windows, 
and would go without dessert for a month of 
Sundays and trudge afoot to save carfare, if 
thereby she might buy an old print, or a bit of 
pottery ; just as I am content to admire the print 
or the pottery in the shop window, feeling sure 
that when they are finally sold to somebody bet- 
ter able to buy them, something else I can admire 
just as much will take their place. Mine is a 
philosophy not altogether to be despised, though 
Alicia rejects it. She handled the blue-and- 
white ware with tender hands, laid the silver 
together, and set the tray upon the window- 
ledge. Then, on a leaf of my pocket memoran- 
dum — she never carries one of her own — she 


24 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


scribbled the following absurdity and pinned it 
to the linen cover : 

Ariel, accept the gratitude of mortals set down hungry 
in the house of Sycorax. Gay and kind spirit, when we 
broke your bread you broke her spell : the wishbone of your 
chicken has cooked her goose! Maker of Music, Donator 
of Dinners, thanks! 

“ And now,” said she, “ having been serenaded, 
and satisfied with nothing short of perfection, 
let’s go up-stairs, Sophy, and decide where we 
shall sleep to-night.” 

We chose the front room because of a gate- 
legged table that Alicia wanted to say her prayers 
beside, and because of the particularly fine por- 
trait of a colonial gentleman above the mantel, 
a very handsome man in claret-colored satin, with 
a vest of flowered gold brocade, a gold-hilted 
sword upon which his fine fingers rested, and a 
pair of silk-stockinged legs of which he seemed 
complacently aware. 

“ I wish you were n’t dead,” Alicia told him 
regretfully. “ Your taste in clothes is above all 
praise, though I fancy you were somewhat too 
vain of your legs, sir. I never knew before that 
men had legs like that, did you, Sophy? ” 

“ I take no pleasure in the legs of a man.” I 
quoted the Psalmist acridly enough. 

“ Don’t pay any attention to Sophy,” Alicia 


AND ARIEL MAKES MUSIC 


25 


advised the portrait, naughtily. “ Just to prove 
how much we both admire you, you shall have 
Ariel’s roses.” She had brought them up-stairs 
with us, and now she walked over to the mantel 
to place them beneath the picture. 

“ Why ! ” exclaimed Alicia, “ why ! ” and she 
held up nothing more remarkable than a package 
of cigarettes, evidently left there recently, for it 
was not dusty. 

“ I dare say Judge Gatchell forgot it, when he 
was looking over the house. That reminds me: 
the silver you admired so much was marked 
‘ G.’ Then, in all probability, Judge Gatchell 
sent us that spread, and very thoughtful it was 
of him, I must say.” 

“ Rheumatic old judges don’t smoke superfine 
cigarettes, Sophy, nor send black tray-bearers in 
terra-cotta robes out on rainy days for the enter- 
tainment of strange ladies. No: this is some- 
thing, or somebody, young. But since when did 
Ariel take to tobacco? ” 

“ Let ’s go down-stairs,” I suggested, “ and wait 
for that old darky, if he is a real darky and ever 
means to return.” I did not fancy those big 
forlorn rooms, with their great beds that didn’t 
seem made for people to sleep and dream in, but 
to stay awake and worry over their sins — and 
then die in. 

The down-stairs halls had grown darker, and 


26 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


the rain came down in a gray sheet, so that the 
open window seemed a hole cut into it. The 
tray we had left on the window-ledge was gone. 
In its place was nothing more romantic than a 
freshly filled and trimmed kerosene lamp, two 
candles, and a box of matches. 

When our Jehu finally returned he rummaged 
out some firewood from the sooty kitchen and 
built us a fire in the hall. He was a pleasant 
old negro, garrulous and kindly, by name Adam 
King, or, as he informed us, “ Unc’ Adam ” to 
all Hyndsville folks. 

“ Uncle Adam/’ Alicia asked, while he was 
drying himself before the blazing logs, “ Uncle 
Adam, who ’s the violinist around here? ” 

Uncle Adam looked at the Yankee lady a bit 
doubtfully. The old fellow was slightly deaf, 
but he would have died rather than admit it. 

“ Wellum,” he told us, “ since oP Mis’ Scar- 
lett ’s gone, folks does say de doctor is. Dat ’s 
’cause ob de Hynds’ blood in ’im. All dem 
Hyndses was natchelly de violentest kind o’ 
pussons, an’ Doctor, he ain’t behin’ de do’.” He 
rubbed his hands and chuckled. “ Lawd, yes ! 
I know de Doctor, man an’ boy, an’ he suttinly 
rips an’ ta’hs when he’s riled! You ought ter 
seen ’im de day ol’ Mis’ Scarlett let fly wid ’er 
shot-gun an’ blowed de tails spang off’n two of 
’is hens an’ de haid off’n ’is prize rooster! De 


AND ARIEL MAKES MUSIC 


27 


fowls come thoo’ de haidge, an’ oY Mis' grab ’er 
gun an’ blaze away. De Doctor hear de squalla- 
tion, an’ come flyin' outer de office an’ right ovah 
de haidge. I ’uz totin’ fiahwood fo’ ol’ Mis’ dat 
day, an’ I drap een de bushes ; it ain’t no place fo’ 
sensible niggahs when white folks grab shot-guns. 
Doctor see me an’ holler : ‘ Adam ! git outer dem 

bushes, you ol’ fool! You my witness what dis 
hellion ’s done to my fowls ! ’ 

“ Ol’ Mis’ Scarlett she s’anter ter de winder 
wid ’er gun sort o’ hangin’ loose, an’ holler: 
‘ Adam ! Come outer dem bushes ’fo’ I pickle yo’ 
hide! You my witness ob dis ruffian trispassin’ 
on my prop’ty an’ cussin’ an’ seducin’ a ol' woman 
widout ’er consent,’ she says. i Has I retched my 
age,’ says ol’ Mis’ Scarlett, * to have his fowls 
ruinin’ my gyardin’, an’ him whut ’s a dunghill 
rooster himself flyin’ ovah my fences unbe- 
knownst? ’ 

“ ‘ If there evah was a leather-hided ol’ hen 
ripe foh roastin’ on Beelzebub’s own griddle, it ’s 
you, you gallows ol’ witch ! ’ says Doctor, shakin’ 
’is fist up at her. 

“ ‘ Aha ! I got a plain case ! ’ says ol’ Mis’, 
grim-like. ‘ I ’ll have a warrant out foh you dis 
day, Geddes, you owdacious villyum ! ’ 

“ And she done it. Yas’m. An’ dey done sont de 
shariff atter me for witness, all two bofe o’ dem.” 

“Well, and what did you do?” I asked, curi- 


28 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


ously. I was getting a side-light on Great-Aunt 
Sophronisba. 

“ Me? I got on muh knees an’ wrastled wid 
de speret,” said, Uncle Adam. “ I done tuck 
mah troubles to de Lawd, whichin He ’bleeged 
ter know I cyant deal wid ol’ Mis’ Scarlett an* 
de Doctor. Missis, I prayed ! ” 

“ Oh ! And what happened then? ” 

The old man looked around him, cautiously, 
and lowered his voice : “ Wellum, Mis’ Scarlett 

she tuck an’ went an’ up an’ died. Yessum! 
She done daid. An’ next thing we-all heah, 
she ’d went an’ lef’ de Hynds place to youna, 
’stead ob de Doctor, or dat furriner.” 

“ She had Hynds relatives, then? I didn’t 
know.” 

“ Wellum, de Doctor an’ ol’ Mis’ Scarlett wuz 
cousins. Dat ’s how come dey could fight so 
powerful. Ain’t you nevah had no relations to 
fight wid, ma’ams? ” 

We explained, regretfully, that we had n’t. 

“ Den you ain’t nevah knowed, an’ you ain’t 
nevah gwfine ter knew, whut real, sho-nough 
fightin’ is/’ said Unc’ Adam, with conviction. 

“ You mentioned a foreigner,” hinted Alicia. 

The old man shook his head deprecatingly. 
“ Don’t seem lak I evah able to rickermembah 
dat boy’s name, nohow. His grarnpa’ ’uz a 
Hynds, likewise his ma, but she ’sisted on 


AND ARIEL MAKES MUSIC 


29 


marryin’ er furriner, an’ de boy takes atter de 
furriners ’stead er we-all. ’T aint de po’ boy’s 
fault, but ol’ Mis’ Scarlett hated ’im wuss ’n 
pizen. De only notice she take er de boy is ter 
warrant ’im fo’ trispassin’. Dat’s how come 
folkses ter say — ” he paused suddenly. 

“ Well, what do folks say? ” I wanted to know. 

“Well, Missis,” he admitted, “ dey say it’s 
natchel to fight wid yo’ kin whilst you ’re livin’, 
but ’t aint natchel ter carry de fight inter de 
grave-yahd. Dat ’s whut she done, ma’ams. 
An’ folks is outdone wid ’er, whichin’ she ain’t 
lef’ de Hynds place to de Hyndses, but done 
tuhn it ovah ter — uh — ah — ” 

“ To a Yankee woman named Smith? ” 

“ Yessum, dat ’s it.” 

“Had either the Doctor or the foreigner any 
real claim or right to this property, do you 
know? ” 

“No, ma’am, we-all ’lows dey ain’t got no 
mo’ law-right dan whut you ’s got. 01’ Mis’ 
Scarlett ain’t 9 bleeged ter lef it to de Hyndses, 
but folks thinks she oughter done it, an’ dey ’s 
powerful riled ’cause she ain’t. Dey minds dis 
wuss ’n all de warrantin’ an’ rampagin’ an’ 
rucusses she cut up whilst she wuz wid us.” 

“ I see,” said I, thoughtfully. 

“ Missises,” said the old man, anxiously, “ you- 
all ain’t meanin’ ter stay hyuh to-night, is you? ” 


30 1 WOMAN NAMED SMITH 

He seemed really distressed at the notion. 
“Lemme take you-all to de hotel, please, 
Missises ! Don’t stay hyuh to-night ! ” 

“Why not? What's the matter with this 
house? ” 

Again he looked around him, stealthily. 

“ It ’s h’anted ! ” said he, desperately. “ Missis, 
listen: I ’uz cornin’ home from prayer-meetin’, 
’bout two weeks ago, walkin’ back er dis same 
place in de dark ob de moon. An’ all ob a sud- 
din I hyuh de pianner in de pahlor, ting-a-ling- 
a-ling! ting-a-ling-a-ling! I say, ‘Who de name 
er Gawd in ol’ Mis’ Scarlett’s pahlor, when dey 
ain’t nobody in it?’ I look thoo de haidge, an’ 
dey ’s one weenchy light in de room, an’ whilst 
I ’in lookin’, it goes out ! An’ de pianner, she ’s 
a-playin’ right along ! Yessum, de pianner, she ’s 
er tingalingin’ by ’erself in de middle o’ de night ! ” 
“ And who was playing it, Uncle Adam? ” 

“ Dat ’s what I axin yit : who playin’ Mis’ 
Scarlett’s pianner when dey was n’t nobody in 
de house? ” 

“ Why did n’t you find out? ” 

“ Who, me? ” cried the old man, with horror. 
“ If I could er borried a extra pahr er laigs 
from er yaller dawg, I’da did it right den, so ’s 
I could run twict faster ’n I done ! — Whichin’ 
please, ma’ams, lemme take you-all ter de hotel.” 
When he saw that he could n’t prevail upon 


AND ARIEL MAKES MUSIC 


31 


us to do so, he left us regretfully, shaking his 
head. He would come back early in the morn- 
ing to do anything we might require. But he 
would n’t stay overnight in Hynds House for any 
consideration. No negro in the county would. 

“ Alicia,” said I, when we had had a cup of 
tea made over our spirit lamp, and firelight and 
lamplight made the place less depressing and 
eerie, “ Alicia, that terrible old woman has 
played me, like an ace up her sleeve, against her 
neighbors and her family. She has left me a 
house that needs everything done to it except to 
burn it down and rebuild it, and a garden that 
will have to be cleared out with dynamite. And 
she has seen to it that I have the preconceived 
prejudice of all Hyndsville.” 

Alicia’s pretty, soft lips closed firmly. 

“ Here we are and here we stay ! ” she said 
determinedly. “ Nobody ’s been disinherited to 
make room for us. Sophy, in all our lives we 
have never had a chance to make a real home. 
Well, then, Hynds House is our chance, and I ’d 
just like to see anybody take it away from us! ” 

“ Up, Guards, and at ’em ! ” said I, smiling 
at her tone. I am slower than she, but even 
more stubborn, as the English are. 

“ Tell your admiral that if he gets in my way 
I will blow his ships out of the water ! ” said 
Alicia, gallantly. 


32 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


But when we went up-stairs, we took good 
care to lock our door, and bolt it, too. Alicia 
said her prayers kneeling by the gate-legged 
table, snuggled into bed between the clean sheets 
we had brought with us, tucked a china dog 
under her chin, and went to sleep like the child 
that she was. I said the Shepherd’s Psalm and 
went to sleep, too. 

I was awakened suddenly, and found myself 
sitting up in bed, staring wildly about the strange 
room. The house was breathlessly still. My 
heart pounded against my ribs, the blood beat 
in my ears. I was oppressed with a nameless 
terror, an anguished sense that something had 
happened, something irremediable. The feeling 
was so strong that my throat closed chokingly. 

I am particular in thus setting it down, be- 
cause it was an experience that all of us under 
that roof had to undergo. You had to fight it, 
shut your mind against it, oppose your will to 
it like a stone wall, refuse to let it master you. 
Then, as if defeated, it would go as suddenly, 
as inexplicably, as it had come. 

That ’s what I did then, more by instinct than 
reason. But I was exhausted when I finally got 
back to sleep. 


CHAPTER III 


THE DEAR LITTLE GOD ! 

W HEN we went over Hynds House the next 
morning and took stock, I began to en- 
tertain very, very peculiar feelings toward Great- 
Aunt Sophronisba Scarlett, who, it would appear, 
had given me a white elephant which I could 
neither hire out for its keep, nor yet sell out of 
hand. I had to live in Hynds House, and Hynds 
House as it stood was n’t to be lived in. 

The rain had ceased, and from the outside 
jungle came innumerable calls of birds, and fresh 
and woodsy odors; but the whole aspect of the 
place was grim and forbidding. At the back, 
where there was n’t such an overgrowth, the lane 
had been closed, barricaded with barbed-wire 
entanglements, and fairly bristled with thistles 
and “ No Trespassing ” signs. 

“All this house needs is a mortuary tablet 
set up over the front door.” 

But Alicia demurred. 

“ I ’m not a bit disheartened,” she declared 
stoutly. “ There ’s just one thing to be done to 
this house — first make it beautiful, and then 

33 


34 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


make it pay. It can be done. It ’s going to be 
done. It ’s got to be done. And when it ’s done 
— we ’ll have a home. Vision it as it ’s going to 
be, Sophy — rosewood and mahogany and wal- 
nut, old brass and china and prints and por- 
traits, the sort of things we ’ye only been able to 
dream of up to now. Why, this house has been 
waiting for us ! We were born to come here and 
make it over : it ’s our house ! ” Alicia, has the 
gay courage of the Irish. 

The heavy iron knocker on the front door 
resounded clamorously. 

“ Uncle Adam thinks we ’ve been ha’nted out 
of existence, and he ’s hammering to wake the 
dead,” said I. 

But it was n’t Uncle Adam to whom we opened 
the door. An enormous, square-shouldered man 
stood there, looking from me to Alicia with 
bright, keen blue eyes behind glasses. He was 
so big, so magnificently proportioned, that he 
held one’s attention, at first, by mere size. Then 
one had time to observe that although he had n’t 
the sleek and careful grooming of successful New 
Yorkers, he wore his clothes as, say, Cceur de 
Lion must have worn mail. He had n’t the brisk 
business manner, either ; but there radiated from 
him an assured authority, as of one used to 
having his orders obeyed without question. No 
one could pass him over with a casual eye. I 


THE DEAR LITTLE GOD! 


35 


have known people who hated him frankly and 
heartily; I have known people who adored him. 
I have never known any one who was lukewarm 
where he was concerned. 

“ Which of you is Miss Smith ?” he asked, 
in a very pleasant voice. “ Miss Smith, I ’in 
your next-door neighbor, house to the right : Doc- 
tor Richard Geddes, at your service.” 

We gave him to understand, with the usual 
polite commonplaces, that we were pleased to 
make his acquaintance, and ushered him into the 
dilapidated drawing-room. 

“ I ’d have come over yesterday, when I learned 
you ’d arrived, except that my cook was suddenly 
seized with the notion she ’d been conjured, and 
I had to — er — stand by and persuade her she 
was n’t. Swore she had my lunch ready, as 
usual ; swore she ’d placed it on a tray, left it 
on the kitchen table for a few minutes, and when 
she came back from the pantry, not ten feet 
away, the tray was gone. Vanished. Disap 
peared. Nowhere to be found. She flopped on 
the floor and howled. She w r eighs two hundred 
and forty pounds and I had n’t a derrick handy. 
I had to roll her up on bed-slats. You ’ve never 
had a conjured two-hundred-and-forty-pounder 
on your hands, have you? No? Well, then, 
don’t. But if you ever do, try a bed-slat. This 
morning she discovered the tray in its usual 


36 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


place, dishes and silver intact, nothing missing. 
She ’s looking for the end of the world.” 

“ O-o-h ! ” quavered Alicia, while I could feel 
my knees knocking together. “ O-o-o-h ! How 
very, very singular ! And — and was that all? ” 

“All! Wasn’t that enough? I’ve had 
burned biscuit and muddy coffee, because my 
cook ’s got liver and nerves, and insists it ’s her 
soul,” said the doctor, grimly. “ I ’ve given her 
to understand that if she hasn’t got her soul 
saved before to-night, I ’ll physic it out of her 
and hang her hide on the bushes, inside out, 
salted ” He added, hastily : “ In the meantime, 

I hope you have n’t fared too badly in this mil- 
dewed jail ? ” 

“ Thank you, no,” Alicia said demurely. 
“We have fared very well.” 

“ Glad to hear it.” The big man looked at 
her with the frank pleasure all masculinity 
evinces at sight of Alicia. And then he asked, 
abruptly : 

“ Has Jelnik called yet? — gray house on the 
other side of you. — No? I dare say he’s off 
on one of his prowls then. A bit of a lunatic, 
but a very charming fellow, Jelnik, though your 
amiable predecessor, Miss Smith, chose to con- 
sider him a sort of outlawed tom-cat, and warned 
him off with a shot-gun.” The doctor paused, 
stroked his beard, and regarded me earnestly. 


THE DEAR LITTLE GOD! 


37 


“ Having heired the old girl’s domain, I hope 
you won’t consider it necessary to heir her — 
er — prejudices,” he remarked hopefully. “ Bad 
lot, Sophronisba. Very bad ! ” 

“ Mrs. Scarlett,” I reminded him gently, “ was 
my relative only by marriage.” 

“ Cousin of mine; mother’s relative. Not on 
speaking-, only on fighting-terms,” he interjected. 

I remembered what Uncle Adam had told us; 
and I’m afraid I eyed him a bit harder than 
politeness warranted. 

“ I discern by your eye, Miss Smith,” said the 
doctor, “ that you think a blood relation is more 
likely to walk in that old demon’s footsteps than 
an outsider is. My dear lady, umder ordinary 
circumstances and with human neighbors, I ’m as 
meek as Moses; I am a lamb, a veritable lamb! 
As for your aunt, she was a man-eating, saber- 
toothed tigress ! ” 

“Not my aunt, Doctor Geddes; your cousin.” 

“ Your aunt-by -marriage. It ’s just as bad. 
Anyhow, she preferred you to any of us, did n’t 
she? ” 

“ Perhaps because she did n’t know me ” 

“ Have it so. But she did whatever she did 
because she was an old devil of a woman, and 
an old devil of a woman can give points to Satan. 
If,” cried the doctor, vehemently, “ there is one 
great reason why a man should be glad he ’s a 


38 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


man, it is because be will never live to be an 
old woman ! ” 

“ That depends upon one’s point of view,” I 
told him firmly. “ Now, I ’m glad I ’m a woman 
because I shall never live to be an old man. Old 
ladies are far, far nicer. Have you ever known 
an old lady who thought herself captivating? 
Have you ever known any old man who didn’t 
think he could be if he wished? ” 

“ Yes,” shouted the doctor, “ and no ! — in both 
cases! There is no sex in fools. There is no 
age limit, either.” 

“ The Talmud says : ‘ An old woman in the 

house is a blessing; but an old man is a nui- 
sance.’ ” 

“ I don’t give a bobtailed scat what the Tal- 
mud says. I know what I know. — Miss Gaines, 
I leave it to you.” 

“ Why, I like them both, when they ’re nice ; 
and I ’m sorry for them both when they ’re not.” 
And she added, with a naive air of confidence: 
“ But I think I like young men better than either, 
as a rule.’ ’ 

The doctor removed his hat again, and sat 
down. His eyebrows went up, his eyes crinkled. 

“ Miss Alicia Gaines,” he said genially, “ I per- 
ceive you are a girl-child of fine promise. — As for 
us, Miss Smith, what have we to do with age 
and foolishness, who, as yet, have neither? Let ’s 


THE DEAR LITTLE GOD! 


39 


get down to business. What are you going to 
do about the lane behind Hynds House? We 
had the use of that lane this hundred years and 
more, until the devil got too strong in Sopliro- 
nisba and she shut it up. Now, shall you keep 
the lane closed, or shall you dismiss the injunc- 
tions? ” 

“ I shall have to consult Judge Gatchell.” 

“ Gatchell ’s a fossilized remains. He ’s 
got no more blood in his liver than a flea. 
Gatchell would hang his grandmother on a point 
of law. Why should you, or any other ordi- 
narily intelligent person, be guided by Gatch- 
ell? ” 

“By whom, then, shall I be guided? You?’' 
I wondered. 

“ That ’s not in my line,” replied the doctor, 
shortly, and thrust his hands into his gloves. 
“ In the meantime, ladies, I ’m your next-door 
neighbor; I have no wife to gossip about you, 
no children to annoy you ; I ’m far enough away 
to keep you from smelling my pipe; and I shall 
quarrel with you only when I can’t help it. In 
return, I have but one favor to beg of you: 
don’t use a shot-gun on my prize chickens ! Get 
a dog and train him to chase them home, if they 
get into your yard. Or catch them and throw 
them over the hedge. I ’ll pay any damages 
within reason. And please send for your cat.” 


40 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


“ We have a cat? ” 

“ You have. After Sophronisba’s death, 
Mandy took her in ; or rather, Mandy was afraid 
to turn her out, for it ’s bad luck to cross a 
witch’s cat. In return for this charity the hussy 
immediately foisted upon us two wholly unneces- 
sary kittens. Mandy would n’t allow them to be 
decently drowned, for it ’s w T orse luck yet to 
tamper with a witch’s cat’s kittens, particularly 
when they ’re as black as the hinges of Gehenna. 
Mandy thinks their mother had them black as a 
delicate mark of respect for the late crone.” 

“ Send them over, please. Black cats will just 
go with this house. It was very thoughtful of 
that cat to have two black kittens ready for us, 
and very kind of you to let them stay with you 
until we came.” 

“I? I abhor the whole tribe of cats!” cried 
the doctor. “ Don’t thank my kindness : thank 
Mandy’s idiocy, of which she has more than her 
just share. To my mind, the best place for cats 
is under the grape arbor.” 

“Let us strike a bargain. You keep your 
chickens in your own yard, and we ’ll keep our 
cats in our own house.” 

“ Compromise : you get a dog,” suggested the 
doctor. 

“ Perhaps I may. I ’ve always wanted a 
poodle.” 


THE DEAR LITTLE GOD! 


41 


“ I said a dog ! ” said the doctor, lifting his lip. 
“A poodle! In Hynds House! The lamented 
Sophronisba had a bloodhound.” 

“ The lamented Sophronisba could have what 
she chose. This Sophronisba prefers a poodle.” 

“Sophronisba? What! Another one? Good 
God ! ” cried the doctor. “ All right ! Get a 
poodle. Keep the cats. Get a parrot — and an 
orphan with the itch — and a hyena — and a 
blunderbuss ! Her name is Sophronisba! — I — 
oh, Lord, where ? s Jelnik? I have got to go and 
warn Jelnik! ” And he made for the door. 

At that Alicia laughed. Peal upon peal, like 
silver bells, irrepressibly, infectiously, irresisti- 
bly, Alicia laughed. She cries with her eyes open 
and her mouth shut, and she laughs with her 
eyes shut and her mouth open. The effect is 
beyond all words enchanting. The doctor 
paused in his headlong flight. 

“ All right : laugh ! ” he said, darkly. “ But 
I shall warn Jelnik, none the less ! ” And mut- 
tering: “Sophronisba! Lord have mercy on 
us! Sophronisba! ” he departed hastily. 

“ W T hat a nice neighbor ! ” commented Alicia. 
She added, musingly : “ Sophy, this is an en- 

chanted place — a place where one has good 
meals, bad advice, and black cats showered on 
one, free and gratis. All one has to do is to stand 
still and take things as they come ! ” 


42 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


u And hope one won't follow in the footsteps 
of one's predecessor, who was an unmitigated 
old devil.” 

“ At least,” said Alicia, laughing, “ he 'll never 
live to be an old woman, will he, Sophy?” 

“ The man has the tact of a cannibal — ” 

“ The shoulders of a Hercules — ” 

“ An abominable temper — ” 

“ And a beautiful beard. Somehow, Sophy, I 
rather approve of a beard, on somebody his size. 
I decidedly approve of a beard ! ” 

“ If his miserable hens come over here, I shall 
most certainly — ” 

“ Keep the eggs. We 'll tell him so when he 
comes again.” 

“ Comes again? What, and my name Sophro- 
nisba? ” 

“ My own grandmother had the second sight ; 
and 1 don't need spectacles,” said Alicia. 
“ Sophy, that man has come into our lives to 
stay. I feel it in my bones! It's not an urn 
pleasant feeling,” she finished gracelessly. 

When Unc’ Adam presently put in his ap 
pearance, he was profoundly impressed and re- 
spectful: we were brisk, unhaunted, and un- 
afraid, after a night in Hynds House ! The three 
colored women who had come with him, induced 
by cupidity and curiosity to enter ol’ Mis’ Scar- 
lett's ill-omened domain, at first hung back. 


THE DEAR LITTLE GOD ! 43 

They were plainly prepared to bolt at the first 
unusual noise. 

Of the three, one — by name Mary Magdalen 
— proved to be a heaven-born, predestinated 
cook; and her we persuaded, by bribery, cajolery, 
and subornation of scruples, to remain with us 
permanently. Only, she flatly refused to stay 
on the place overnight. Darkness should n't 
catch Mary Magdalen under the Scarlett Witch’s 
roof-tree. 

There are certain gifted beings who possess the 
secret of bringing order out of chaos; for them 
the total depravity of inanimate objects has no 
terrors; inanimate objects become docile to their 
will. Such a one was Mary Magdalen. In two 
days she had transformed a sooty cavern into 
a clean and orderly kitchen. For she was a 
singing and a scourful woman ,and her Sign was 
the speretual and the scrubbing-brush. It is true 
that she put a precious old Spode tea-pot on the 
stove and boiled the tea in it ; that she hung her 
wig and the dish-towel on the same nail : and 
that she immediately asked for a white stocking 
foot to use as a coffee-bag. 

“ But don’t you-all go bust no new pai’h,” she 
advised economically. “ Ah ’d rathah make mah 
coffee in a ol’ white stockin’ foot any day, jes’ 
so you ain’t done wo’ out de toes too much.” 

“ Sophy,” said the horror-struck Alicia, “ that 


44 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


woman must be watched until we can buy a 
percolater. Suppose she ’s got ‘ a oP white 
stockin’ foot ’ of her own ! ” 

Despite which there never was, never will be, 
such another cook as Mary Magdalen. It is true 
she wasn’t amenable to discipline, and reason 
wasn’t her guiding-lamp. And nothing — not 
bribes, threats, entreaties, prayers, orders, com- 
mands, moral suasion — could break her of doing 
just what she wanted to do just when and how she 
wanted to do it. You ’d be entertaining your 
dearest enemies, serene in the consciousness that 
your house was a credit to your good manage- 
ment; and behold, Mary Magdalen in the draw- 
ing-room door, with her wig askew and her hands 
rolled in her apron : 

“ Oh, Miss Sophy ! ” 

“Well?” say you, resignedly, with a feigned 
smile; ^ what is it, Mary Magdalen?” 

“Miss Sophy, you know we-all’s sugah?” 

“ Yes.” 

“ Wellum, Miss Sophy, ’t ain’t any.” 

“ I have already ordered more, Mary Mag- 
dalen.” 

“ An’ you know ouah flouah, Miss Sophy? ” 

<( J V 

“ Us ain’t got a Gawd’s speck ! ” 

Then she would beam upon the visitors, all of 
whom were known to her. 


THE DEAR LITTLE GOD! 


45 


“ Howdy, Miss Sally ! How you-all cornin’ 
on ? Ah cornin’ ’round to see de baby soon ’s 
Ah gits chanst.” Or, “ Lawsy me, Miss Jinny, 
dat boy o’ yo’s is jes’ natehelly bustin’ outer de 
clo’es wid growin’, ain’t he? He jes’ de spit o’ 
he pa, bless ’im ! ” 

Which untoward confidence did n’t seem to 
surprise our visitors. They had Mary Magda- 
lens of their own. 

A few days later Doctor Geddes sent us 
Schmetz, the gardener, a gnarled little man with 
a peppery temper, a torrential flow of Alsatian 
French, and a tireless energy. I don’t know why 
nor how Schmetz had come to Hyndsville, except 
that somehow he had acquired a small farm near 
by and could n’t get away from it. He explained 
to us, gently but firmly, that if we would n’t 
meddle after the manner of women, but would 
leave his job in his own hands, it would be better 
for us, and for the garden. We meekly acquiesc- 
ing, he called in helpers and with a wave of his 
hand set hoe and ax and spade to work. 

The weather had changed into days of deep 
blue skies, splendid days full of the warmth of 
potential power; and nights filled with fra- 
grance, nights of fierce beauty, and the glamour 
of golden moons, and the thrilling melody of that 
feathered Israfel, the mocking-bird. Through 
our open windows immense moths, spirits of the 


46 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


summer nights, drifted in on enameled and 
jeweled wings and circled in a fire- worshiping 
dance around our light. 

Those were wonderful days. For that was a 
house of surprises, a house full of laid-by things. 
One never knew what one was going to find. 
One morning it might be a Ridgway jug all 
delicate vine leaves and faun heads, or an old 
blue-and-white English platter, or a piece of fine 
salt-glaze. On the top shelf of a long-locked 
closet, pushed back in the corner, you ’d dis- 
cover a full set of the most beautiful sapphire 
glassware, and a pagoda work-box with ivory 
corners ; and on a lower shelf, wrapped in half a 
moth-eaten shawl, two glowing luster jugs in 
proof condition. Mary Magdalen salvaged a fine 
china sillabub stand, with little white-and-gold 
covered cups on it, from a sooty box under a 
kitchen cupboard. A back drawer of the dusty 
office desk yielded up half a dozen exquisite 
prints. And I ’m sure Alicia will remember even 
in heaven the ecstasy she experienced when a 
battered bureau gave into her hands the adorable 
Bow figures of Kitty Clive and Woodward the 
actor, she pink-and-white, petticoated and fur- 
belowed, lovely as when London went mad over 
her, and he cocked-hatted and ruffled and dandi- 
fied; and neither with so much as the least 
littlest chip to mar their perfection. 


THE DEAR LITTLE GOD! 


47 


Or a hair trunk would reveal little frocks 
stitched by hand, and a pair of tiny flat slippers 
with strings gone to dust like the little feet 
that had worn them. With these were two dolls, 
one dressed in sprigged India muslin and lace, 
with a shepherdess hat glued on her painted 
head ; the other dressed in a poke-bonnet, a satin 
sack, and a much-flounced skirt. They had evi- 
dently belonged to “ Lydia, our Darling Child,” 
whose name, in unsteady letters, was painfully 
set down in the printed picture-books at the 
bottom of the trunk. These things that had be- 
longed to a “ darling child ” so long dead lent the 
grim old house a softening touch. Poor old 
house, whose little children had all gone, so long 
ago! 

It was the day we were taking up the beauti- 
ful old carpet in the back drawing-room. Alicia 
was rejoicing for the thousandth time over this 
treasure of hand-woven French art. Of a sud- 
den, horrible yells rose from the garden, and a 
shrieking negro went by the window like an 
arrow. We caught “ Murder! — OF Witch ! — 
Corpses ! ” as he disappeared. Uncle Adam, 
catching his panic, bolted with him; the two 
negro women followed. Only Mary Magdalen, 
amazonian arms bare, a rolling-pin grasped in 
a formidable fist, stood like a rock of defense 
behind us. 


48 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


“ Ah jes’ wants to catch any ol’ corpses 
trapesin’ ’round mah kitchin, trackin’ up mah 
clean flo’, an Ah ’ll suah settle day hash once fo’ 
all ! ” trumpeted Mary Magdalen. 

Outside, Schmetz was jumping up and down, 
flapping his arms, and screaming in voluble 
French : 

u Name of a dog! Senseless Senegambians, 
remain! Iron-skulled offspring of the union of 
a black mule and a pickax, cease to fly ! ” 

“ What is the matter? For heaven’s sake, 
what is the matter? ” I shouted. 

“We done dig up de corpses! We done fin’ 
wha’h dat ol’ witch ’oman bury de bodies ! ” 
howled a workman in reply. 

“ Imbeciles, asses, beings without brains, listen 
to me ! ” shrieked Schmetz, this time in good 
English. “ This corpse is not alive! Never yet 
was he alive! Return, sons of perdition, and 
assist me to raise him — may he fall upon your 
brain-pans of donkeys ! ” 

As if that had been all that was needed, the 
last wavering workman flung down his shovel 
and took to his heels, running like a rabbit and 
roaring as he ran. 

“ Schmetz ! ” called a clear and peremptory 
voice. “ Schmetz ! what ’s the matter over 
there? ” 

“Ah! It is Monsieur Jelnik!” bawled 


THE DEAR LITTLE GOD! 


49 


Schmetz. “ Nom de Dieu , Monsieur Jelnik, come 
with a great quickness! I have dug from the 
earth the leetle boy of stone — you know him, 
heinf Those niggers, sacrement! they think 
they have uncovered the deceased corpse, the 
victim of Madame the late mistress, with which 
she made her spells of a sorceress.” 

“ What ! ” said the voice. “ You ’ve found the 
statue, Schmetz? Ask, my good fellow, if it 
is permitted that I come and view it.” 

“ Why, of course ! ” said I, quickly. 

“ Thank you,” said the voice. 

There had been a great space cleared in our 
garden, and on the edge of this, in removing a 
stubborn gum-tree, the negroes had uncovered 
what they supposed to be the body of one mur- 
dered. Upon our knees, with Schmetz helping 
us, we were trying to tear away the rotten cov- 
erings, and the dirt and mold. And there, beau- 
tiful despite the stains disfiguring him, lay the 
boy Love. The marble pedestal from which he 
had been removed lay near him. On the base, 
decipherable, was the sculptor’s name, and on one 
side, in small letters, “ Brought from Italy , 1803 , 
by R . H.” 

“ Why, he is perfect! ” cried Alicia, joyfully. 
“ Oh, who could have been so stupid and so 
cruel as to hide away something so lovely? Poor 
dear little god, aren’t you glad to get out of 


50 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


that grave and come back to the sun? Aren’t 
you grateful, little god, that Sophy and I came 
to Hynds House? ” 

And at that moment a tall, slim, dark-skinned 
young man walked up, hands behind his back, 
and stood there regarding us with eyes as clear 
and cool as mountain water when the sunlight 
is upon it and golden flecks come and go in its 
brown depths. The exquisitely aquiline fea- 
tures, the small black mustache, an indescrib- 
ably proud and high-bred ease and grace of man- 
ner and bearing, were oddly exotic and even 
more oddly fascinating. His slenderness was as 
strong as a tempered sword-blade, his quietness 
was trained power in repose. And the hair of 
his head was so black that a purplish shadow 
rested upon it, and so thick that one was minded 
of Absalom: 

... in all Israel there was none to be so much praised 
as Absalom for his beauty : from the sole of his foot to the 
crown of his head there was no blemish in him. 

And when he polled his head (for it was at every year’s 
end that he polled it: because the hair was heavy on him, 
therefore he polled it : ) , he weighed the hair of his head at 
two hundred shekels after the king’s weight. 

He was so vivid and so new to me that my 
whole being was breathless with the wonder of 
him. I knew, of course, that he did not belong 


THE DEAR LITTLE GOD! 


51 


to my world at all. King’s sons are for prin- 
cesses, for those human birds of paradise that 
flash, beautiful and fortunate, in larger spheres 
than those prosaic paths trodden by a worka- 
day woman named Smith. 

“ What have you found? ” he asked, in a de 
lightful voice. 

Alicia looked up. Her face was like the break 
of day for youngness and freshness, and a wisp 
of a bright curl misbehaved itself on her cheek, 
a flirtatious curl that knew exactly how to make 
the most of its opportunities. The young man’s 
eyes approved of it. 

“We have found Love ! ” cried Alicia, breath- 
lessly. “ Sophy and I have found Love in our 
garden ! Is n’t it wonderful and impossible and 
exciting and delightful? But it’s true! And 
it just goes with this whole place! ” cried Alicia, 
morning-eyed and May-faced. 

The young man’s glance came back to me. I 
should hate to be untruthful, and have to meet 
so straight a glance! 

“ Why, yes. It is impossible, and, like all im- 
possible things, perfectly true,” he agreed, with 
the golden flecks dancing in and out of his eyes 
and a slow and lazy smile, a sort of secret smile, 
curving his beautiful, mocking mouth. “ Fancy 
finding Love, of all things, in Sophronisba’s gar- 


52 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


den ! ” A fine black line of eyebrow went up 
whimsically. “ And now that yon have found 
him,” said Mr. Jelnik, “hadn’t you better let 
me help you set him up? ” 


CHAPTER IV 


THE HYNDSES OF HYNDS HOUSE 

W HEN the fine weather had taken the 
kinks out of Judge Gatehell’s joints, he 
came to see us — a tall, thin, punctilious, satur- 
nine old gentleman with frosty Scotch eyes and 
the complexion of a pair of washed khaki trous- 
ers. Chaos reigned in Hynds House then, and 
he was forced to pick his way, like an elderly 
and cautious cat, between piled-up chairs, tables, 
and rolls of carpet. In the most stately man- 
ner he parted the tails of his skirted coat, seated 
himself upon the sofa, placed his hat beside him, 
drew up the knees of his black broadcloth trou- 
sers, took off and wiped his spectacles with great 
thoroughness and deliberation upon a large silk 
handkerchief, replaced them upon the middle of 
his Roman nose, cleared his tnroat, pursed his 
lips, and drily but clearly talked business. 

Great-Aunt Sophronisba would have left a 
much larger fortune had she been less addicted 
to lawsuits. You would n’t think an old soul of 
53 


54 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


almost a hundred could find very much chance 
to brew mischief, would you? You did n’t know 
Great-Aunt Sophronisba ! 

I was informed that the case of Scarlett vs. 
Geddes had been automatically closed by the 
death of the plaintiff ; but I had inherited along 
with Hynds House : 

The case of Scarlett vs. The Vestry and Pastor 
of St. Polycarp’s Church, from whom Mrs. Scar- 
lett sought to recover three paintings — “ Faith,” 
“ Hope,” and “ Charity ” — which her father had 
commissioned a visiting artist to paint, and had 
then presented to St. Polvcarp’s, with the stipula- 
tion that they should “ forever hang in the sacred 
edifice, reminding the brethren of the Cardinal 
Virtues of the Christian Religion.” 

They did hang in the church for a century. 
Then, when the Ladies’ Missionary Society was 
helping “ do over ” the parsonage, a faded Faith, 
a dulled Hope, and a fly-specked Charity were 
transported thither. Whereupon suit was imme- 
diately brought by the donor’s daughter, who 
averred that the church had lost all right and 
title to the paintings by an action directly con- 
trary to her father’s will, and insisted that they 
should be turned over to herself as sole heiress. 
It was a nice little case, and called forth an im- 
posing array of counsel. Mrs. Scarlett had 
added a codicil to her will, leaving me her claim 


THE HYNDSES OF HYNDS HOUSE 55 


to the three paintings “ fraudulently withheld by 
the pastor and vestrymen of St. Polycarp’s 
Church.’’ 

There was, too, the question of the lot on 
Lafayette Street, between Zion Church on the one 
hand, and the Y. M. C. A. on the other. Both 
had tried to buy it; and both had been refused 
with contumely. Instead, that nice old lady ran 
up extra-sized bill-boa*rds. Every time the Zion- 
ist brethren looked out of their side windows of a 
Sunday, they had ample opportunity to learn 
considerable about the art of advertising on bill- 
boards. And if a circus happened to be coming 
to Hyndsville, they could count on every child in 
their Sunday school missing his lesson, unless 
the text, by a fortunate chance, happened to touch 
upon the prophet Daniel. 

And when the Y. M. C. A. people looked out of 
their side windows, Sophronisba’s alluring bill- 
boards besought them to smoke only certain ciga- 
rettes and to be sure to look for the trademark on 
their playing-cards. Naturally, this made the 
Y. M. C. A. secretaries very, very happy. 

A weather-beaten picket fence protected the lot 
upon the street front ; the bill-boards formed the 
side attractions ; and in the center front was the 
monument, a stone of stumbling and offense. It 
was a neat, plain granite obelisk, which bore this 
inscription : 


5G 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


This Stone is Erected 
By the Affection 
of 

Sophronisba Hynds Scarlett 
To Commemorate the Many Virtues 
of 

The Most Perfect Gentleman in Hyndsville 
Her Bloodhound 
NIPPER 

“ There should have been an open season for 
Sophronisba,” Alicia said with conviction. Then 
she put her head down and laughed. 

The judge looked at her over his glasses, 
doubtfully. With a slight edge to his voice he re- 
ferred to the several prosecutions “ for wanton 
and wilful trespassings ” upon the closed, barbed- 
wire lane behind Hynds House. As the strip in 
question was not a public thoroughfare, and Mrs. 
Scarlett had rock-ribbed titles covering it, she 
could close it; and she did, greatly to the incon- 
venience of her immediate neighbors, particularly 
Doctor Richard Geddes. 

“ There is something to be said for Mrs. Scar- 
lett’s methods,” said the judge dryly. “ The 
Lafayette Street bill-boards are the best-paying 
ones in Hyndsville. As to closing the lane, Miss 
Smith, let me remind you that Doctor Geddes, al- 
though an estimable man and a very able physi- 
cian, is not at all backward in coming forward in 
a quarrel. He greatly angered my late client.” 


THE HYNDSES OF HYNDS HOUSE 57 


“ Nevertheless, that barbed wire comes down. 
He may use the lane whenever he wants to,” I de- 
cided. 

The judge bowed. “And now,” he said, po- 
litely, “ let us take up the case of Mr. Nicholas 
Jelnik, if you please. It was Mrs. Scarlett’s 
wish that you should be fully informed concern- 
ing Mr. Jelnik’s antecedents, that you might be 
on your guard.” 

“Against Mr. Jelnik? But, good heavens, 
why? Why?” I was beginning to get angry. 
“ Let me see : I am to make myself odious to Mr. 
Jelnik, and I am to refuse to allow a physician to 
run his car through a barren strip of weeds and 
sand, because they are her relatives and she hated 
her relatives. I am to vex the souls of harmless 
Christians with bill-posters of the world, the 
flesh, and the devil, and I ’m to pay taxes on a lot 
that ’s been turned into a cemetery for a hound 
dog. I ’m to fight St. Polycarp’s Church, for a 
couple of chromos I should probably loathe. — I 
don’t like pictures of cardinal virtues, anyhow. 
It altogether depends on who possesses them as to 
whether I can stand for the cardinal virtues 
themselves.” 

“ Faith looking up, and Charity looking down, 
and Hope hanging to an anchor, something like 
Britannia-Rules-the- Waves. Make the church 
keep them, please, Sophy ! ” begged Alicia. 


58 A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 

Judge Gatchell made an odd noise in his 
throat. 

“ One of my little granddaughters, taken to 
Saint Polycarp’s by her mother, asked , 6 Mamma, 
who is that big woman up there with the pick- 
axe? ’ And they told her,” said the Judge, 
scathingly, “ they told her it was Hope! 

“ When the vestry came to me about the case, 
I reminded them that Aholah and Aholibah were 
damned for doting upon paintings on the wall, 
painted in vermilion, which in plain English is 
Scarlett ! ” A covenanting gleam shot into his 
frosty eyes, and the old fighting Scotch blood 
showed for a second in his lank cheek. He was a 
godly man, and when he saw T confusion in the 
ranks of the Philistines, he rejoiced. 

“ I can’t help who was damned,” said I. “ My 
job is to live in peace with my neighbors. St. 
Polycarp’s people may hang their Virtues wher- 
ever they please, for all of me.” 

Did a faint, faint shade of regret flit over the 
parchment-like face? It seemed so to me. But 
he said, composedly: 

“ You must act according to your best judg- 
ment. And now, please, let us go back to Mr. 
Nicholas Jelnik.” 

We rather prided ourselves upon the possession 
of so pleasant a neighbor, and we said so. He 
had helped us with our garden, and it was he 


THE HYNDSES OF HYNDS HOUSE 59 

who selected the spot upon which the resurrected 
Love should be set up. 

“ Ah, yes, the statue, brought from Italy by 
Richard Hynds, a gr£at grandfather of his. Did 
he tell you anything about Richard ?” asked the 
judge. 

“ Nothing.” 

“ I shall have to go a long way back, more 
than a hundred years, to make you understand,” 
said the judge. “ When I was a boy some of the 
oldest folk here in Hyndsville used to say that 
Hynds House never should have come to Free- 
man Hynds, Mrs. Scarlett’s father; but to Rich- 
ard Hynds, his elder brother — that same Rich- 
ard whose initials are cut in the base of the statue 
he brought in his pagan godlessness from Italy, 
and which his brother afterward buried, wish- 
ing to remove all trace of him and his follies. 

“ You are to understand that it was the unwrit- 
ten law of the Hyndses’ that this house should 
come to the eldest son. Primogeniture is of 
course foreign to American ideas, but this is an 
old house, Miss Smith. When it was built, 
American ideas had n’t been born. And the 
Hyndses were a law to themselves. 

“ The then head of the house was James Hamp- 
den Hynds, a man of an immense pride, a rigid 
sense of duty, and the nicest notions of honor. 
He had two sons, Richard, and the younger 


60 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


brother, Freeman. The daughters do not count : 
it is with these two sons we are concerned. 

“From every account Freeman Hynds was a 
good man, a quiet, God-fearing, methodical man, 
attentive to his affairs, and meticulously exact in 
all his dealings; not warm-hearted, perhaps, but 
just. But as if the bad blood of the entire family 
had come to a head in one man, Richard was bom 
a roisterer and a spendthrift. 

“ He grew up a magnificent young scapegrace, 
reckless to the point of madness, and with that in- 
herent love of risk that is the very breath of life 
to such men. Despite these defects there is no 
doubt that his was one of those personalities that 
win love without effort. So of course it was a 
foregone conclusion that he should win the girl 
that his younger brother, among others, adored 
to distraction. 

“ His family hoped that his love for his young 
wife would change him for the better. But there 
was something tamelessly wild in Richard Hynds. 
He would have done very well, very well indeed, 
in the Golden Hind with Drake, or in the Jesus 
with Morgan. He did not fit in a gentler genera- 
tion, and a mild life had no charm for him. 
Gossip buzzed with his name, even in a day when 
gentlemen were permitted to behave pretty much 
as they pleased. 

“Up to this time there had never been any- 


THE HYNDSJES OF HYNDS HOUSE 61 


thing altogether unpardonable charged against 
him. But one fine morning the Hynds jewels 
were missing. Remember that the Hyndses had 
always been a wealthy and powerful family. 
The theft of those jewels was no trumpery affair. 
For generations they had been adding to that 
collection — sometimes a lustrous pearl, some- 
times a flawless emerald ; once it was a sapphire 
that had belonged to a French queen, once a pair 
of rubies that had hung in the ears of a duchess 
beloved of King Charles. 

“ Richard’s mother happened to be a meek 
and quiet body, deeply religious, something of a 
Quakeress, so she wore them but seldom. It 
was upon the occasion of a ball to be given in 
honor of Freeman’s twenty-first birthday that the 
question of what jewels his mother should wear 
came up, and the strong-box in which they were 
kept was opened. Only the settings remained. 

“ When the clamor quieted and sane questions 
began to be asked, suspicion fastened upon Rich- 
ard Hynds. His affairs were chaotic, his needs 
imperative and desperate. He had been heard to 
ask his mother if she intended wearing what he 
called ‘ the Hynds fortune ’ at Freeman’s ball. 
He knew, of course, where they were kept — in 
the anteroom of his mother’s apartment. It was 
not only possible but easy for him to gain access 
to them. 


62 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


“Let us consider the case without prejudice: 
Here is a young man — a gambler, a wastrel — 
with pressing debts, and clamoring creditors 
threatening what might be considered dishonor. 
Within reach of this young man’s hand are cer- 
tain very valuable properties which he might 
even consider his own, since they would in time 
descend to him. His mother’s resources are ex- 
hausted, his father’s heart steeled against fur- 
ther advancements. Cause and effect, you see — 
debts : missing jewels. 

“ The case not only formed two factions in 
public opinion; it split the Hynds family itself. 
His two sisters, and his cousin Jessamine, raised 
in this house, believed him guilty. His mother 
and his wife believed in his innocence and refused 
to hear a word against him. These two things 
only did Richard Hynds salvage in that utter 
wreck and catastrophe — his mother’s faith and 
his wife’s love. 

“ He lost his father’s. This was a man, who, 
under his pleasant exterior of a landed gentle- 
man, was rigid and inflexible. He had already 
borne a great deal, remember; but this was dis- 
grace, an indelible stain upon a stainless name. 
Therefore this father, who was at the same time 
a just and good man, disinherited his favorite 
child and eldest son. House, slaves, lands, 
money, the great position of the head of a power- 


THE HYNDSES OF HYNDS HOUSE 63 


ful family, came to Freeman Hynds, my late 
client’s father, born five years later than his 
brother, on the twentieth day of September, 1785 
— a long time ago! a long time ago! 

“ Richard was disgraced, and a beggar. And 
it seemed that the rod that had lain in pickle for 
the Hyndses for their pride, was brought forth 
to scourge them all. For Richard, desperate, 
distracted, careless of what happened to him, 
rode out one day through a pelting rain. Result, 
congested lungs; the poor wastrel, who had no 
wish to live, was soon satisfactorily dead. 

“ When James Hampden got that news, he rose 
up from his chair, laid the book he had been read- 
ing — it was Baxter’s ‘ Saint’s Rest ’ — down on 
the library table and fell as if lightning had 
struck him. Apoplexy, it was said; a thrust 
through the heart, I should call it. Richard the 
sinner was none the less Richard his first-born. 

“ Hard upon the heels of these two disasters 
came a third, the case of Jessamine Hynds. 
This Jessamine — a highly gifted, imperious 
creature, proud as Lucifer, after the manner of 
the Hyndses — was an orphan, reared in Hynds 
House. She was some several years older than 
her cousins, to whom she was greatly attached. 
The trouble so preyed upon her that she became 
melancholy, and one fine day disappeared and 
was never afterward found. There was great 


64 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


hue and cry made for her, and men riding hither 
and yon, for this was a Hynds woman, and her 
story touched popular imagination, so that she is 
supposed,” said the lawyer dryly, “to wander 
around Hynds House o’ nights, crying for Rich- 
ard and searching for the lost jewels. 

“After the death of James Hampden Hynds, 
it was discovered that he had added a singular 
enough codicil to his will. This codicil provided 
that in the event the jewels were found intact, 
and Richard Hynds’s innocence thereby incon- 
trovertibly established, Hynds House as it stood 
should revert to him as eldest son, after the cus- 
tom of the family. But until the jewels were 
recovered, Richard and his heirs were to have 
exactly — nothing. And nothing is what Rich- 
ard and his heirs got.” 

“And was he really guilty? ” breathed Alicia. 
Her sympathy was instantly w T ith Richard. 
That is exactly like Alicia, who is sorry for the 
fatted calf, and the Egyptians drowned in the 
Red Sea, and Esau swindled out of his birth- 
right; had she been one of the wise virgins she 
would have trimmed the lamps of all the foolish 
ones and waked them up in time. 

“ In theory,” said the judge, “ a man is inno- 
cent until he is proved guilty. In practice, he is 
guilty until he can prove his innocence.” 

“And was nothing, absolutely nothing, ever 


THE HYNDSES OF HYNDS HOUSE 65 


heard or known further? — nothing that would 
justify his mother’s faith, or comfort his poor 
young wife’s heart? ” 

“ There was but one incident to which even 
the most credulous could attach the slightest im- 
portance. You shall judge for yourself whether 
it deserved any. Freeman Hynds, riding about 
the plantation after his habit, was thrown from 
his horse and died from the injuries sustained. 
He recovered consciousness for a few minutes be- 
fore he died ; some said he never really regained 
it. Be that as it may, the dying man cried out, 
in a voice of great anguish and affliction : r Rich- 
ard! Brother Richard! The jewels — the 
jewels !’ He struggled to say more, and failed; 
looked into the concerned faces around him, with 
the awful look of the soul about to depart ; strug- 
gled to raise himself; and fell back upon his pil- 
low a corpse. 

“ Some — they were in the majority — said, 
sensibly enough, that the pain and disgrace of his 
brother’s downfall had haunted the poor gentle- 
man’s death-bed, and occasioned that last sad 
cry. Some few said he had wished to confess a 
thing heavy upon his conscience, who had taken 
his brother’s place as Jacob took Esau’s. Rich- 
ard’s wife, of course, was of these latter. She 
went to her grave a passionate believer in the 
innocence of her husband, whom she averred to 


66 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


have been a deeply wronged and cruelly used 
man ; and, for heaven’s sake, who do you suppose 
she claimed had wronged him? Freeman! She 
couldn’t prove anything; she hadn’t the ghost 
of a clue to hang the ghost of an accusation upon ; 
yet, womanlike, she clung to her notion, and sh© 
taught it to her son as one teaches a holy creed. 

“ The Hyndses were excellent haters. Free- 
man’s daughter, born into an atmosphere of fam- 
ily disruption, abhorred the very memory of her 
uncle, and hated her uncle’s wife, the woman 
who doubted and led others to doubt her father’s 
honesty. This hatred she discovered for Rich- 
ard’s son, who, as he grew older, referred to 
Freeman as ‘ my Uncle Judas.’ 

“ This second Richard became in time a highly 
successful physician, a man honored and beloved 
by this community. There was no wildness in 
him , nor in his sop, the third Richard. His 
granddaughter Sarah Hynds married Professor 
Doctor Max Jelnik, the celebrated Viennese 
alienist, whom she met abroad. Your next-door 
neighbor is Sarah’s son, born somewhere in Hun- 
gary, I believe. Both the young man’s parents 
are dead, and I understand he has led a vagrant 
and irresponsible life, preferring to rove about 
rather than follow his father’s profession, to 
which he was educated. 

“ My late client, indeed, held that he had in- 


THE HYNDSES OF HYNDS HOUSE 6? 


herited the deplorable characteristics of the first 
Richard. She asserted — she allowed herself 
great freedom of speech — that you can’t make a 
silk purse 'out of a sow’s ear. It displeased her 
that he should come to Hyndsville. She thought 
it showed a malignant nature and a peculiar 
shamelessness that he chose to reside next door 
to Hynds House, from which his great-great- 
grandfather had been so ignominously driven. 
Her first meeting with the young man bred in her 
an ineradicable dislike.” 

Now what really happened is this: The fences 
having been neglected, and in consequence fallen 
down, and the hedge broken in many places, Mr. 
Jelnik, just come to Hyndsville, thoughtlessly 
and perhaps ignorantly crossed the sacred Scar- 
lett boundaries. Up-stairs behind her blind, like 
an ancient spider in her web, the old lady spied 
him. She flung open the window and leaned out. 

“ Who are you that prowl about other peoples’ 
yards like a thievish cat? ” she demanded peremp- 
torily. 

The young man looked up, uncovering his beau- 
tiful head. 

“ I am Nicholas Jelnik. And I pray your par- 
don, Madame: I did not mean to intrude,” and 
he made as if to go. 

“ Jelnik ! ” said she, in a hoarse and croaking 
voice. “ Jelnik! Aha! I know your breed! I 


6S 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


smell the blood in you bad blood! rotten bad 
blood! You’ve a bad face, young man: a 
scoundrelly face, the face of a fellow whose 
grandfather robbed his house and shamed his 
name! And why have you come near Hynds 
House, at this hour of the day? He, he, he! / 
know, I know ! ” 

Lost in astonishment, Jelnik remained staring 
up at her. The apparition of this venerable 
vixen, who had hated Richard’s son and now 
hated him of a later generation, who had seen 
those that had talked to Richard himself in his 
ill-fated lifetime, so stirred his imagination that 
it deprived him of utterance. All he could do 
was to stand still and stare and stare and stare. 
He had never seen anybody so old — she was 
nearly a hundred, and looked a thousand — and 
he stared at the old, old, wrinkled, yellow face, 
the unhuman face, in which the beady black eyes 
burned with wicked fire ; at the nearly bald head, 
thinly covered with a floating wisp or so of wool- 
like white hair ; at the claw-like, shriveled, yellow 
hands, the stringy neck, the whole sexless meager 
wreck of what had been a woman. It was a stare 
made up of wonder, and instinctive dislike, and 
human pity, and young disgust. She raised her 
voice : 

“Did you not see those signs? Scoundrel, 
puppy, foreign -born poacher, did n’t you see my 


THE HYNDSES OF HYNDS HOUSE 69 


sign-boards?” And as she looked down at him 
— Kichard’s blood alive and red in a youthful 
and beautiful body : and she what she was — she 
fell into one of those futile and dreadful fits 
of rage to which the evil old are subject; 
and mumbled with her skinny bags of lips, 
and shook and nodded her deathly head, and 
waved her claw-like hands, screeching insults and 
abuse. 

The pity died out of Jelnik’s face. He re- 
garded her with his father’s eyes, the calm, im- 
personal, passionless gaze of the trained alienist. 
She was an unlovely exhibition, to be studied 
critically. In some subtle manner she under- 
stood, for she jerked herself out of her anger, and 
fell silent, regarding him with a glance as bril- 
liantly, deadly bright as a tarantula’s. The cold, 
relentless hate of that glance chilled him. He 
forced himself to bow to her again, and to beat a 
dignified retreat, when his inclination was to 
take to his heels like a school-boy caught pil- 
fering apples. 

The next morning a bailiff presented Mr. Nich- 
olas Jelnik with a notice forbidding him to enter 
the grounds of Hynds House without the written 
permission of the owner, and threatening prose- 
cution should he disobey. 

“The Hyndses, as I have said, are good 
haters,” finished Judge Gatchell. 


70 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


“ And so she left Hjnds House to me,” said I 
without, I am afraid, much gratitude. 

“ It was hers, to dispose of as she chose.” The 
lawyer spoke crisply. “If you have any scruples, 
dismiss them. My late client understood that it 
was far better for the estate to fall into the hands 
of a sensible woman like yourself than into the 
keeping of a young man with what foolish peo- 
ple like to call the artistic temperament, which in 
plain English means a person who can’t earn his 
salt in any useful, sensible business. 

“You doubt this? Let us consider this same 
artistic temperament and its results,” continued 
the judge, making a wry face. “ Once or twice 
it has been my bad fortune to meet it. One 
trifling scamp I have in mind, painted. A house, 
a fence, a barn, even a sign-board? Not at all, 
but messes he called ‘ The Sea/ one does n’t know 
why, save that the things slightly resembled raw 
oysters. However, the women raved over him. 
His laundress and his landlady had good cause 
to rave ! 

“ He wrote, too. A text-book, a title, a will, a 
deed, a business letter? Far from it ! He wrote 
poetry, \i you please! The little wretch wrote 
poetry ! That ’s what the artistic temperament 
leads a man to ! Bah ! I hate, I despise, I ab- 
hor, the artistic temperament ! ” 

We looked at the judge, open-mouthed. “ Who 


THE HYNDSES OF HYNDS HOUSE 71 


would have thought the old man to have had so 
much blood in him? ” 

“ There have been times,” admitted the judge, 
subsiding, “ when I radically disagreed with my 
late client ; when I opposed her strongly. But 
when she willed her whole estate to you, Miss 
Smith, instead of to Nicholas Jelnik, I heartily 
approved. Understand, I have no personal bias, 
no animosity against this young man ; but he is, I 
am told, more or less of an artist, and one might 
as well leave an estate to an anarchist at once. 
I have expressed this opinion to the town at 
large, and I seldom express my opinion publicly,” 
finished the old jurist stiffly. 

I heard that opinion with mingled emotions. 

“ But w’e like Mr. Jelnik,” I said at last. 
“ The injunction against him does n’t hold water. 
Personally, I feel like apologizing to him.” 

“ Oh, no! One can’t afford to cuddle an old 
vendetta, as Abishag dry-nursed old King David. 
I always hated Abishag! ” Alicia said naively. 

“ My late client,” said the judge enigmatically, 
“ had n’t counted on you ” He almost succeeded 
in looking human when he said it, and his eyes 
upon Alicia were n’t at all frosty. Then he 
folded his papers, replaced them in his wallet, 
wiped his glasses, shot his cuffs, hoped we ’d 
find Hynds House all we ’d hoped, hoped the 
town would be to our liking, hoped he could be 


72 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


of further service to us, bowed ereakily, and took 
his departure. 

“ Sophy,” said Alicia, after a long pause, “ if 
ever I had to rechristen this house, I ’d call it 
Hornets’ Nest.” 

We had not attended church on our first Sun- 
day, because we were too tired. But on our sec- 
ond Sunday we plucked up heart of grace and 
went to St. Polycarp’s. 

The old town wore an air of Sabbath peace and 
quietness infinitely soothing to the spirit. Peo- 
ple passed and repassed us. We knew they knew 
who we were. The old gentlemen, indeed, bowed 
to us with stately uncoverings of the head; the 
rest regarded us with the sort of impersonal and 
perfunctory interest one bestows upon unin- 
teresting passing strangers. Nobody spoke to 
us, though the eyes of the young men were not un- 
aware of Alicia’s fairness. 

In a great city, of course, one takes that sort 
of thing for granted; but in this small town, 
where everybody knew and spoke to everybody 
else, the effect was chilling. 

“ Talk about the sunny South ! ” murmured 
Alicia. “ Why, my teeth want to chatter ! ” 

During the services I was conscious of covert 
glances in our direction, but whenever a pair of 


THE HYNDSES OF HYNDS HOUSE 73 


feminine eyes met mine, they slid off like lizards 
and glided another way, with calculated Chris- 
tian indifference. They were n’t hostile, nor un- 
friendly : they were just deliberately indifferent. 
Nobody had the faintest notion of being heedful 
of us strangers among them; and I should be 
sorry for angels who expected to be entertained 
unawares in South Carolina! 

When the congregation had filed out and gone 
about its leisurely business, the minister and his 
wife came forward to greet us. They were a bit 
nervous, remembering the diabolic uproar about 
Faith, Hope, and Charity. Mr. Haile was a 
mild-mannered little man of the saved-sheep type, 
with box-plaited teeth and a bleating voice. His 
wife had the worried face and the anxious eyes 
of the minister’s helpmeet, and the painfully 
ready smile for newcomers who might, or might 
not, prove desirable parishioners. 

She wanted to be nice to us as a Christian 
woman to women, but not too nice as the mini- 
ster’s wife of a church whose members looked 
upon us as interlopers. I had deputed Judge 
Gatchell to inform the trustees that the suit was 
dropped. I suppose Mrs. Haile was timid about 
broaching the delicate subject, for she ignored it 
with a nervous intensity that made me feel sorry 
for her. She and Mr. Haile would call just as 


74 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


soon as it was convenient for us to receive visit- 
ors; and then they shook hands with us, and I 
think they breathed a sigh of relief. 

“ Oh, Sophy ! And we ’ve got to keep on going 
there! — next Sunday, and Sunday after next 
Sunday, and maybe every Sunday after that un- 
til we die ! Perhaps after a while some of them 
will bow to us, or maybe even say, ‘ How do you 
do?’ but we’ll feel as if we’d been put in cold 
storage every time we enter that door ! ” wailed 
Alicia. 

“ It is our Father’s house,” I reminded her. 

“ But I don’t want to be made to feel like a 
spanked child, in anybody’s house ! ” Alicia said, 
resentfully. 

“ You say that because you ’re Irish.” 

“ You say I say it because I ’m Irish because 
you ’re English.” Then she screwed up her 
mouth like a coral button, and squinted her eyes : 
“ I ’m Irish, and you ’re English, and we ’re both 
American. Sophy, let ’s join my Irish and your 
English to our Yankee, and teach this town a 
lesson ! ” 

“ Barkis is willin’. But in the meantime let ’s 
go home and see what Mary Magdalen has for 
lunch.” 

We walked slowly, enjoying the calm, lovely 
late-summer day. Hyndsville at its best was a 
big, green, sprawling old town, a quaint, un- 


THE HYNDSES OF HYNDS HOUSE 75 


painted, leisurely, flowery, bird-haunted place, 
with glorious trees, and do-as-they-please, inde- 
pendent gardens. Nobody ever seemed to be in a 
hurry, and at first we used to wonder how they 
ever got anything done, or kept pace with the 
moving world; yet they did. Only, they did it 
without haste and without noise. And they were 
always polite. Though they should take your 
substance, your reputation, or even, perhaps, 
your life, they would do it like ladies and gen- 
tlemen. 

We paused a while, just inside the big brick- 
pillared gate, and looked up the oak-arched gar- 
den path toward our house. Of course one can’t 
expect an old fortress of a brick house that ’s 
been neglected for more than three quarters of 
a century to look spick and span inside of a brief 
fortnight, but already Hynds House was sitting 
up, so to speak, and taking notice. 

Life had begun to flow back into it. Mary 
Magdalen had brought a dog with her — a yel- 
low dog of unknown ancestry, of shamefaced de- 
meanor, a ropy tail, splay feet, and a rolling eye ; 
named, she and heaven alone knew why, Beauti- 
ful Dog. 

He shunned Alicia and me because we were 
white people: Beautiful Dog was intuitively 
aware that colored people’s dogs must meet white 
people with suspicion, aloofness, and reserve. 


76 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


When we fatuously sought to make friends with 
him, he tucked his tail between his legs, and 
shivered as if we made goose-flesh come out on 
his spine ; and once when I took him by his rope 
collar he fell down and shrieked. But just let 
Mary Magdalen roll out an unctious, “ Whah 
is yuh, Beautiful Dawg? ” and his ears and tail 
went up, he curveted, and made uncouth move- 
ments with his splay feet, and grinned from ear 
to ear. 

Doctor Geddes’s Mandy had brought over the 
black kittens and their mother. Mary Magdalen 
made sure of their staying at home by the simple 
process of buttering their paws. In South Caro- 
lina, when you want a cat to stay in your house, 
you butter its paws and let it lick the butter off 
leisurely, the while you whisper in its left ear: 
“ Stay in my house for keeps, cat! ” The cat will 
ever thereafter play Ruth to your Naomi. 

Our cat was Mrs. Belinda Black, and her chil- 
dren were Potty Black and Sir Thomas More 
Black, this last being a creature of noble mien 
and a meditative turn of mind. 

“ Homage and praise to Bast, the cat-headed, 
the wise one, the great goddess ! ” purred Alicia, 
stroking Mrs. Belinda Black’s satiny head. 
“ And may Sekhet the Cat of the Sun aid me, a 
devotee at her shrine, to butter the paws of some 
two-legged cats in Hyndsville ! ” 


THE HYNDSES OF HYNDS HOUSE 77 


“ You-all’s dinnah ’s waitin’.” Mary Magda- 
len stubbornly held to the notion that any meal 
eaten between breakfast and night was dinner; 
lunch being sandwiches and fried chicken taken 
out of a basket at church picnics and eaten out of 
one’s hand, or lap, for choice. “ What was de 
text to-day, Miss Sophy? Ah sort o’ likes to 
chaw easy on a mout’ful o’ text whilst Ah ’m 
washin’ up mah dishes.” 

We gave her the text, which happened to be 
one that fills every negro’s heart with undiluted 
joy : “ O ye dry bones, hear the word of the Lord.” 
And we had the satisfaction of hearing her roll- 
ing out, to the clatter of pans and pots : 

“ Dry bones in de valley, 

Ma-a-ah, La-a-awd! 

Whut ynli gwine do wid dem dry bones, 

Ma-ah-ah La-a-a-w-wd ” 

while we went up-stairs to change our frocks. 
We were still sharing one room then, finding it 
more convenient. And there, in front of our 
door, in a nest of ferns and mosses, was a great 
cluster of wild flowers, summer’s last and 
autumn’s first children. They had been gath- 
ered in no ordered garden, but taken from the 
skirts of the fields and the bosom of the woods; 
and Carolina the opulent, the beautiful, the free- 
handed, does not deck herself niggardly. 


78 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


Alicia’s face that had been so wistful lighted 
with a sudden joy. She gave a happy cry : 

“ Ariel ! ” she cried, “ Ariel ! Oh, what a heav- 
enly thing, what a human thing to do ! And to- 
day, too, just when we need a little bit of friend- 
liness ! ” She looked around with a queer, shy 
smile. 

“ Ariel ! ” she called, “ Ariel, no matter who 
comes, or goes, or what happens in Hynds House, 
we believe in you. Don’t leave us, Ariel ! 
Maker of music, bringer of blossoms, stay ! 


CHAPTER V 


“thy neighbor as thyself” 

M r. NICHOLAS JELNIK, with an uplift 
of his fine black brows and a satirical 
smile, once diagnosed the case of Great-Aunt 
Sophronisba Scarlett as “ congenital Hynds- 
itis ” ; Doctor Richard Geddes said you ’d only 
to take a glance at her house to see that she was 
predestined to be damned. I know that she was 
so hidebound in her prejudices, so virulently 
conservative, so constitutionally opposed to 
change, that anything savoring of modernity was 
anathema to her. 

That old woman would as lief have had what 
remained of her teeth pulled out as have parted 
with anything once brought into Hynds House. 
She preserved everything, good, bad, indifferent. 
You ’d find luster cider jugs, maybe a fine toby, 
old Chinese ginger jars, and the quaintest of 
Dutch schnapps bottles, cheek by jowl with an 
iron warming-pan, a bootjack, a rusty leather 
bellows, and a box packed with empty patent- 
medicine bottles, under the pantry shelf. A hel* 
79 


80 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


met creamer would be full of little rolls of twine, 
odd buttons, a wad of beeswax, a piece of asafet- 
ida, elastic bands, and corks. She had used a 
Ridgway platter with a view of the Hudson 
River on it, as a dinner plate for her hound, for 
we found it wrapped up, with “ Nipper’s plat- 
ter” scrawled on the paper. 

By and large, it was n’t an easy task to reno- 
vate a brick barracks finished in 1735, and occu- 
pied for ninety-nine years by a lady of Sophron- 
isba’s parts; though I sha’n’t tell how we had 
to tackle it room by room, nor of the sweating 
hours spent in, so to speak, separating the sheep 
things from the goat things. I can’t help stop- 
ping for a minute, though, to gloat over the front 
drawing-room that presently emerged, with a 
cleaned carpet that proved to be a marvel of hand- 
woven French art, rosewood sofas and chairs up- 
holstered in royal blue and rubbed to satiny- 
browny blackness, two gloriously inlaid tables, 
and a Venetian mirror between two windows. 

We gave the place of honor on the white 
marble mantel to a porcelain painting Alicia 
found in a work-box — the picture of a woman 
in gray brocade sprigged with pink-and-blue 
posies, a lace fichu about her slim shoulders, and 
a cap with a rose in it covering her parted 
brown hair. The little boy leaning against her 
knees had darker blue eyes, and fairer hair 


“ THY NEIGHBOR AS THYSELF ” 81 


pushed back from a bold and manly forehead. 
The painting was about the size of a modern 
cabinet photograph, and, though pleasing and 
spirited, was evidently the work of a gifted ama- 
teur. What gave it potent meaning and appeal 
was the inscription lettered on the back : 

Mrs. Lydia Hariott Eynds & Rich*. Eynds Ag’d 7 
Taint’d for Col nl . J. E. Eynds by his 
Affec. Neece Jessamine 

You could n’t help loving him, the little “ Rich- 
ard Ag’d 7.” There was that in the face which 
won you instantly; it was so clear-eyed, so 
gallant, so brave, so honest. So we gave him 
and his pretty, meek mother the place of honor 
in the room that had once heard his laughter and 
seen her tears. And we brought down-stairs the 
fine painting of Colonel James Hampden, who 
was the splendid colonial in claret-color that we 
had so much admired, and hung him and a 
smaller painting marked, “ Jessamine, Aged 22 ” 
Where they could look down on those two. 

These were the only pictures allowed in that 
room, and they gave to it an atmosphere flavored 
most sweetly of yesterday. Indeed, I think they 
must have approved of the room altogether, for 
we had n’t changed so much a*s we ’d restored 
it. Even the glass shades that used to shield 
their wax candles were in their old places. 


82 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


There was their old-world atmosphere of state- 
liness; their Chinese jars, their English vases, 
their beautiful old Chelsea figures ; and the sam- 
pler so painstakingly 

Work’d by Ann Eliza Hynds 
Ag’d 9 Yrs. 2 Mos., Nov’r , 1757 

that had been carefully framed and mounted as a 
small fire-screen, perhaps for Ann Eliza’s lady 
mama or proud grandmother. It was such hu- 
man and intimate things, the mute mementoes of 
children who had passed, that made us begin to 
love Hynds House, for all its bigness and un- 
canniness and dilapidation. 

We did discover one human touch laid upon 
the place by Sophronisba herself. She had gath- 
ered together a full set of small, hand-colored 
photographs of Confederate generals, wrapped 
them in a hand-made Confederate flag, into which 
was tucked a receipt signed by Judah Benjamin 
for Hynds silver melted into a bar and given to 
the Cause, written, “ The glory is departed,” 
across the package, and hidden it. Alicia, who 
had a hankering after Confederates, herself, put 
the photographs in a leather-covered album at 
least as old as themselves, and kept them sa- 
credly. She said these were America’s own van- 
quished and vanished Trojans, and that one got a 
lump in the throat remembering how 


“ THY NEIGHBOR AS THYSELF ” 83 


Fallen are those walls that were so good, 

And corn grows now where Troy town stood. 

Schmetz brought us our upholsterer, Riedriech 
the cabinet-maker, most cunning of craftsmen, 
who knew all there is to know about old furni- 
ture and just what should and should n’t be done 
to it. In addition he was a grizzled, bearded, 
shambling old angel who clung to a reeking pipe 
and Utopian notions, a pestilent and whole- 
hearted socialist who would call the President 
of the United States or the president of the 
Plumbers’ Union “ Comrade ” equally, and who 
put propagandist literature in everything but 
our hair. 

“ Mr. Riedriech,” you would say reproach- 
fully, “ yesterday I discovered Karl Marx 
and Jean Jaur£s lurking behind my coffee-pot 
and Fourier under the butter-dish. To-day I 
find Karl Kautsky in ambush behind the 
cream-jug and Frederick Engels under the 
rolls.” 

Riedriech would regard you paternally, plac- 
idly, benevolently, through his large, brass- 
rimmed spectacles : 

“ So? Little by little the drop of water the 
granite wears away. I give you the little leaflet, 
the little pamphlet, mid by and by comes the lit- 
tle hole in your head.” 


84 A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 

Thank heaven the doctor next door did n’t hear 
that! 

Alicia knew how to handle the old visionary 
with innocent but consummate skill. Looking 
at the kind old bear with her Irish eyes: 

“ It must be a wonderful thing to have such 
mastery of one’s tools, to know exactly what to 
do and how to do it,” she would sigh. “ ’Tis n’t 
everybody can be a master craftsman ! ” 

“ I show you in a little while what iss cabinet- 
making ! ” he said proudly. “ I do more yet by 
you,” he added charitably, “ then make over for 
you chairs and tables and such, already : I make 
over for you your little mind.” 

The old socialist did indeed show us what 
cabinet-making can be. He turned the office be- 
hind the library into a workroom, and from it 
Sophronisba’s tattered and torn and forlorn old 
things emerged, piece by piece, in shining rose- 
wood and walnut and mahogany majesty. If you 
love old furniture; if it gives you a thrill just to 
touch a period chair of incomparable grace, or 
the smooth surface of an old table, or the curve 
of a carved sofa, you ’ll understand Alicia’s open 
rapture and my more sedate delight. 

The tiled fireplace in the library was really the 
feature of Hynds House. There w T as n’t any 
mantel : the fireplace was sunk into the wall, and 
above it and the book-cases on each side was a 


“ THY NEIGHBOR AS THYSELF ” 85 


space filled with more relics than all the rest of 
the house contained — portraits, signed and 
framed documents, letters, old flags, and a whole 
arsenal of weapons. Above tfhe fireplace hung 
the portrait of Freeman Hynds — thin, dark, 
austere, more like a Cameronian Scotsman than 
a Carolina gentleman of an easy habit of life. 

However, it was not portrait or relics that 
made the room remarkable, but the tiles, each a 
portrait of a Revolutionary hero. Laurens, 
Marion, Lafayette, Pulaski, von Steuben — there 
they were in buff and blue, martial, in cocked 
hats, and with such awe-inspiring noses! The 
center and largest tile was, of course, the Father 
of his Country, without the hat, but with the 
nose, and above him the original flag, with the 
thirteen stars for the thirteen weak-kneed little 
states that were to grow into the great empire of 
freedom that the high-nosed, high-hearted sol- 
diers fought for and founded. Alicia and I 
touched those tiles with reverence. They were 
the pride of our hearts. 

As often happens in the South, there were bed- 
rooms on the lower floor; two of them, in fact, on 
one side of the hall. The front one had been not 
only locked but padlocked ; the windows had been 
nailed on the inside, and heavy wooden shutters 
nailed on the outside. So long had the room been 
closed that dry-rot had set in. The silk quilt 


86 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


on the four-poster was falling to pieces, the linen 
w r as as yellow as beeswax, and the sheets made 
one think of the Flying Dutchman’s sails. This 
room was of almost monastic severity : an ascetic 
or a stern soldier might have occupied it. Be- 
sides the bed it contained four chairs, a clothes- 
press, a secretary, and a shaving-stand. On a 
small table near the bed were a Wedgwood mor- 
tar wdth a heavy pestle, a medicine glass, and a 
pewter candlestick turned as black as iron. The 
press in the corner still held a few T clothes, thread- 
bare and sleazy, and in the desk were some dry 
letters and a Business Book — at least, that ’s 
how it was marked — wuth lists of names, each 
having an occupation or task set dowm opposite 
it, I suppose the names of long-dead slaves. On 
the fly-leaf w r as written, in a neat and very legi- 
ble hand, “Freeman Hynds.” 

“ Sophy ! ” Alicia’s voice had an edge of awe. 
“ This must have been his room. I believe he 
died here, in this very bed. And afterward they 
shut the room up ; and it has n’t been opened 
until now.” 

We looked at the old bed, and seemed to see 
him there, trying to raise himself, crying out 
so piteously upon dead Richard’s name, only to 
fall back a dead man himself. What had he 
wanted to tell, as he lay there dying? His 
painted face in the library was not a bad man’s 


“ THY NEIGHBOR AS THYSELF ” 87 


face. It was proud, stern, stubborn, bigoted; a 
dark, unhappy face, but neither an evil nor a 
cruel one. What was it that really lay between 
those two brothers? After more than a hundred 
years, we were as much in the dark as they in 
whose day it had happened and whose lives it 
had wrecked. 

We built a fire in the long-disused chimney to 
take the dampness out of the room, and forced 
open the windows to let in the good sun and 
wind. Over in one corner, pushed in between the 
clothes-press and the side wall, was, of all things, 
a prie-dieu; and upon it a dusty Bible with 
his name on t‘he fly-leaf. Nor was it a book kept 
for idle' show ; it plainly had been read, perhaps 
wept over by a tortured heart, for it fell open at 
that cry of all sad hearts, the Fifty-first Psalm. 
I was moving this prie-dieu, when my foot slipped 
on the bare floor and I dropped it with a crash. 
Fortunately it was not injured. But what had 
looked like a mere line of carving on the outer 
edge of the small shelf — rather a thick and 
heavy shelf now that one examined it carefully 
— had been struck smartly, releasing a cunning 
spring. There opened out a thin slit of a drawer, 
just big enough to hold a flat book bound in 
leather and stamped with two letters, “ F. H.” 
On the fly-leaf appeared, in his own neat, fine 
script, “ The Diary of Freeman Hynds, Esqr.” 


88 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


The thing seemed incredible, impossible. His 
own daughter had evidently been unaware of the 
existence of this book, which he had not had time 
to destroy. And we, as by a miracle, had fallen 
upon it — and perhaps the truth ! 

It was written in so fine and small a hand as 
was only possible to the users of goose-quill pens ; 
and this tiny, faded, brown writing on the yel- 
lowed pages covered a period of years. He had 
not been one to waste words. Once or twice, as 
we hurriedly turned the pages, appeared 
the name “ Emily.” Mostly it seemed a dry, un- 
interesting thing, a mere memorandum, where a 
single entry might cover a whole year. 

It was impossible for us to stop our work to 
read it then and there, or to do more than give it 
a cursory glance. We turned feverishly to those 
years that covered, as we figured, the period of 
the Hynds tragedy. And he had written : 

This day was Accus ’d Rich ’d. my Bro. of robbing us of 
our Jewells. He protests - he knows Naught & my Mthr. 
believes him as doth Emily. Has a true Heart, Emily. 
Horrid Confusion & my Fthr. Confound’d. 

Impatiently I turned over the pages, raging to 
read the end, my heart pounding and fluttering. 

Two nights since dy ’d Scipio, son of old Shooba’s wife, 
the which did send for me — ■” 


“ THY NEIGHBOR AS THYSELF ” 89 


Thus far had I read, Alicia and I sitting head 
to head on the hall stairs. In came Schmetz the 
gardener, raving, gesticulating, and after him old 
Uncle Adam, stepping delicately, and with a pla- 
cating smile on his wrinkled countenance. 

“ Those bulbs that I have planted under the 
windows of you,” raved Schmetz, “ the demon 
hens of le docteur Geddes are with their paws up- 
turning! They upturn with rapidity and com- 
pleteness, led by a shameless hog of a rooster. Is 
it the orders of you that I devastate those fowls, 
Mademoiselle? ” 

Schmetz was furiously angry, and small won- 
der. Those had been choice bulbs, some of which 
he had presented me from his own cherished 
store — freesias, daffodils, tulips, hyacinths, and 
the starred narcissus, “ such as Proserpine let 
fall, from Dis’s wagon.” 

“ Oh, our flowers ! ” wailed Alicia, springing to 
her feet ; “ and we counting on those bulbs for 
Christmas ! ” 

I shut Freeman’s diary with a snap. Hens 
were more immediate. 

“ Put it in the drawer of the library table,” 
called Alicia, running out with Schmetz at her 
heels. “ We ’ll read it to-night.” 

When I had done so, closing the door after me, 
I too ran outside, where some enormous black- 
and-white hens, led by the biggest rooster I had 


90 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


ever seen, were completing the utter destruc- 
tion of our flower bed. 

We charged down upon them, and they ran to 
and fro, after the stupid fashion of fowls. Back 
and forth Alicia, Schmetz, and I chased those 
brutes ; but Adam stood with folded hands, look- 
ing on from a safe and sane distance. He re- 
fused to have anything to do with Geddes fowls 
in ol’ Mis’ Scarlett’s yard. Just then the huge 
rooster ran into my skirts, all but upsetting me. 
It was the work of a strenuous moment to seize 
him by the wings and so hold him. 

Left to their own devices, the hens scuttled 
back to their own domain through a break in the 
palings on our side of the hedge, while in my 
hands the rooster squawked and plunged and 
kicked and struggled ; it was like trying to hold a 
feathered hyena. 

I was very angry. I had lost my bulb bed. I 
could n’t wring the neck of the raider, much as 
I should have liked to do so, but with an arm 
made strong by a just and righteous rage I lifted 
that big brute high above my head and hurled 
him over into his own yard. He sailed through 
the air like a black and white plane. 

“Damn! Oh, damn!” said somebody on the 
other side of the hedge. There was a horrible 
grunt, as of one getting all the wind knocked out 


“ THY NEIGHBOR AS THYSELF ” 91 


of him, a scuffle, and the squawks of the big 
rooster, to which the hens dutifully added a 
deafening chorus. 

“ The brute — has just about — murdered 
me ! ” grunted Doctor Richard Geddes. 

We stood in stricken silence. Swiftly, noise- 
lessly, Uncle Adam faded from sight, putting a 
solid section of Hynds House between himself 
and what he felt was coming battle. Uncle 
Adam had no wish to have to pray me to death, 
and he was n’t going to run any risks with Doctor 
Richard Geddes. Where that irascible gentle- 
man was concerned, Uncle Adam, like Br’er Rab- 
bit, would “ trus’ no mistakes.” 

A second later, red-faced, half-breathless, but 
with the light of battle in his eyes, Doctor Geddes 
appeared, mounted on a ladder on his side of the 
hedge. 

“ Who shot off that rooster? ” 

“Monsieur le docteur, the hens of you began 
this affray,” explained Schmetz, politely. 
“ They are fowls abandoned in their morals, hor- 
rible in their habits, and shameless in their be- 
havior. And the husband of these wretches, 
Monsieur, is a bandit, a brigand, an assassin, fit 
only to be guillotined. Observe, Monsieur, it 
happened thus — ” 

“ Schmetz,” snapped the doctor, “ shut up ! — 


92 A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 

Now then, I want to know who fired off that 
rooster.” 

“ I did ! ” I said valiantly. “ Look at my 
bulbs ! J ust look at my bulbs ! ” 

“ Look at my stomach ! ” roared the doctor. 
“ Just look at my stomach ! ” 

“Mon Dieu! 0 mon Dieu! ” cried Schmetz, 
dancing up and down. “ Monsieur, again I im- 
plore that you will remain calm and listen to the 
voice of reason ! Your hens, creatures malicious 
and accursed — ” 

“ Why should I look at your horrid stomach ? ” 
said I, outraged. “ I think you had better get 
down off that ladder and go away ! ” 

“ Why should you? Because, you jade, you ’ve 
all but driven a twenty-pound rooster clean 
through it — beak, spurs and tail feathers — 
that ’s why ! ” bawled the doctor. “ Gad ! I shall 
be black and blue for a fortnight ! I ’m colicky 
now : I need a mustard-plaster ! ” 

“ Two mustard-plasters,” I insisted severely : 
“ one on your tongue and the other on your 
temper ! ” 

“ Temper? ” flared the doctor, and flung up his 
arms. “ Temper? Here ’s a minx that ’s all but 
murdered me, and yet has the stark effrontery to 
blather about temper! You >ve a bad one your- 
self, let me tell you ! You ’ve the worst, outside 
of your late aunt — ” 


“ THY NEIGHBOR AS THYSELF ” 93 


“ Grand-aunt-in-law ; jour own cousin-by- 
blood, whom you greatly resemble in that same 
matter of family temper, I am given to under- 
stand.” 

“ Gatchell told you that ! ” cried the doctor, 
wrathfully. “ Fish-blooded old mummy ! His 
place is in a Canopic jar ! Gatchell has n’t had a 
thought since 1845.” 

“ Well, if he satisfied himself so long ago as 
1845 that you have a frightful temper and that 
your hens are unutterable nuisances, I see no 
reason why he should change his mind,” I said, 
frigidly. “ You have ; and your hens are ; and 
your rooster is a demon! ” 

“ Straight out of the pit ; undoubtedly they 
were hatched under Satan’s wings. Monsieur, 
believe me, Schmetz, when I tell you so.” 

“ Did n’t you ask me,” I demanded, “ to throw 
them over into your yard when they invaded^my 
premises? Very well: I threw one over and 
you caught it. Why, then, should you com- 
plain?” 

“ Oh, yes, I caught it ! ” A horrible sneer 
twisted his countenance. 

Schmetz fell to praying aloud. But he 
couldn’t remember anything save the grace be- 
fore meat, so he prayed that, in a sonorous voice. 
For he is a pious man. 

The doctor’s nose wrinkled and his lips 


94 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


stretched : “ Sophronisba! ” he hissed, and, hav- 

ing hurled this hand-grenade, scuttled down the 
ladder like a hoy of ten. 

Alicia sank upon the ground and rocked to and 
fro. For a minute I wanted to catch her by the 
shoulders and shake her soundly; but catching 
her eye instead, I also fell into helpless laughter. 
Leaning on his spade, Schmetz stared at us, shak- 
ing his grizzled head. 

“ Name of a cat ! ” murmured the puzzled Alsa- 
tian, and fell to salvaging such bulbs as were n’t 
utterly ruined. We were all busy at this, when 
a head again appeared over the hedge — a big, 
leonine head with a tossing mane and a tameless 
beard. An enormous pair of shoulders followed, 
a tree-trunk of a leg was swung over, and Doctor 
Richard Geddes dropped into our garden like a 
great cat. He strolled over, hands in pockets, 
and looking down at grubbing us, asked politely : 
“ Making a garden? ” 

“ Oh, no,” Alicia told him sweetly, “ we ’re lay- 
ing out a chicken-run.” 

“ Er — what I came over to say, is that I ’ve 
got some fine bulbs, myself, this year, particularly 
fine bulbs — eh, Schmetz? — and more than I 
need for myself. Will you share them with me, 
Miss Smith ? Please ! I — well, I ’d be really 
grateful if you would,” said this overgrown boy. 


“ THY NEIGHBOR AS THYSELF ” 95 


“ We ’ll be enchanted/’ Alicia said instantly. 
“ When can we have them, please? ” 

“Now!” cried the doctor, with brightening 
eyes. “ By jingo, I ’ll get ’em this minute, and 
plant ’em for you, too ! ” 

And he did. He was on his knees, trowel in 
hand, shouting to Riedriech, who had come out- 
side for a few minutes’ happy arguing with his 
good friend the doctor, that the socialist argu- 
ment boiled down amounts to about this — that 
one should do without boiled eggs for breakfast 
now, in order that the proletariat may have 
baked hen for dinner in the millennium ; which is 
lunacy; anybody with a modicum of brains — 

“ Brains ! ” snorted Riedriech. “ What is it 
you know about brains? No doctor knows what 
is on the inside of brains! You make tinkerings 
mit the inside plumbings, Gott bewakre! and 
cut up womens and cats and such-like poor little 
dumb beasts and says you, ‘ Now I know all aBbut 
the brains of man.’ It is right there where you 
are wrong, Comrade Geddes ! ” 

“ Habet!” said Comrade Geddes. 

“ Look you,” said the old visionary, with sud- 
den passion, “ look you on the little bulb here, 
so dirty and ugly you hide him in the ground 
quick. So! But by and by comes up green 
shoots, and blossoms. So it is with the great 


9G 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


thoughts of men, the deep race-thoughts, Com- 
rade Geddes — seeds, bulbs, germs, all of them, 
in the ugly husks of the common people. Out of 
our muck and grime they come, the little green 
shoots which the fool will say is poison, maybe, 
but which the wise know and labor and make 
room for. I, Kiedriech, and workers like me, 
we go into our graves nothing but husks. But 
it is out of the buried hearts of us comes green 
things growing; and then — die Blnmen! die 
B lumen! ” said the cabinet-maker, with a still, 
far-away look. 

“ And,” he finished, with a sad smile, “ it is our 
flowers that you put in vases of gold on your 
altars. And you say, ‘ Listen : Jesus the carpen- 
ter talks plain words to his fishermen friends.’ 
And, ‘ Hush ! Burns the plowman makes songs 
in the field ! ’ ” 

The doctor looked up, and his eyes were very 
tender; his smile made me wonder. With a 
swift, friendly hand he patted the rougher hand 
of the other. And it was at this opportune mo- 
ment that Mary Magdalen led around a corner 
of Hynds House no less personages than Mrs. 
Haile and Miss Martha Hopkins. Their eyes 
fell upon Doctor Bichard Geddes. They looked 
at each other. They looked at Alicia and me. 
And I knew their thoughts : “ Sirens, both of 
you ! ” said Miss Hopkins’s eyes. 


“ THY NEIGHBOR AS THYSELF ” 97 


“ How do you do, Doctor Geddes ! ” said both 
ladies, as demurely as cats. I should have felt 
like a boy caught stealing jam. He went right 
on planting bulbs. 

“ Hello, Martha. What ’s on the carpet 
now?” he greeted that lady, airily. “Writing 
another paper on ‘ The Ironic Note in Chivalry ’? 
How about ‘ The Effect of the Pre-Raphaelites 
upon the Feeble-minded ’? Or is it the ‘ Rela- 
tion of the Child to Its Mother/ this time? ” 

“ You will have your little joke, Doctor,” 
smiled Miss Hopkins, a dish-faced blonde with a 
cultured expression. 

“ Joke? ” The doctor stared up at her. 
“Joke? Gad, I ’d like to believe it!” He 
turned to Alicia and me, politely : “ Miss Hop- 

kins,” he informed us, “ moves among us clothed 
in white samite. She is our center of culture; 
Hyndsville revolves around her.” 

He went on putting a bulb in the place pre- 
pared for it. His eyebrows twitched slightly, 
but his mouth was smileless; Miss Hopkins was 
smiling, and not at all displeased. Mrs. Haile 
was bland and blank, as befits a minister’s wife. 
Alicia’s eyes were downcast, but a wicked dimple 
came and went in her cheek. She looked rav- 
ishingly pretty, the bright hair breaking into 
curls about her temples, her young face colored 
like a rose. I do not blame Doctor Richard 


98 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


Geddes for stopping in his work to stare at her 
with unabashed pleasure, but I do not think it 
was diplomatic. 

Mrs. Hhile apologized for calling when we 
were so very busy. They had just stopped in 
passing, because they were reorganizing their 
missionary society and wanted to see if they 
could n’t interest us in the good work. Their 
day-school in Mozambique needed another 
teacher, and their hospital in Bechuanaland had 
to have more beds. 

Doctor Geddes got to his feet, slapped our gar- 
den soil from his knees, and shook his tawny 
mane. His eyes were no longer sweet. 

“ Miss Smith and Miss Gaines, thank you for 
the opportunity of playing in the sand in pleas- 
ant company. Mrs. Haile, Miss Hopkins, I go 
to attend some home-grown niggers who of course 
don’t need a hospital, nor even a decent school, 
in our Christian midst. Ladies, good after- 
noon ! ” He made a fleering motion of the hand 
and was gone. Mrs. Haile and Miss Hopkins 
smiled indulgently. Evidently, Doctor Geddes 
was one brother they were willing to forgive 
though he offended them until seventy times 
seven. 

Alicia and Miss Martha Hopkins walked down 
the garden path together and Mrs. Haile fell 
into step with me. In a low voice she thanked 


“ THY NEIGHBOR AS THYSELF ” 99 


me, hurriedly, for having dropped that dreadful 
suit. And were we — she hesitated — were we 
going to be regular communicants? 

I did n’t want to go to St. Polycarp’s any more, 
and it was on the tip of my tongue to give a po- 
litely evasive reply, when our eyes met and held 
each other. I saw the naked truth in hers — the 
pitiful truth of the slim, poor, aristocratic little 
parish; the old church overtaken and surpassed 
by its more modern and middle-class rivals ; and 
the minister’s family struggling along on a salary 
that would have made a hod-carrier strike. She 
was neatly dressed; she looked like a gentle- 
woman, but one in straightened circumstances. 
I made a rapid mental calculation. 

“ Why, yes, I think I can say we shall. Now, 
Mrs. Haile, I am a business woman, and if I 
speak bluntly you must pardon it. Miss Gaines 
and I can give two hundred dollars a year be- 
tween us — fifty for the church ; one hundred 
and fifty to be added to the minister’s present 
salary.” 

I knew what that meant to her, and she must 
have known I knew, but she didn’t show it by 
so much as the quiver of an eyelash. Only a 
faint, faint color showed in her sallow cheek, 
and she bowed, half-formally, half-friendly. 

“ Thank you, Miss Smith,” said she, gallantly. 
And she added, with a glimmer of humor in her 


100 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


worried eyes : “As you say you - re a business 
woman, may I say I hope you will get your 
money’s worth?” 

At that I laughed, and she with me. 

We walked down our garden path, chatting 
innocuously and amiably, until of a sudden they 
caught sight of the little Love, the gay, charm- 
ing, naked little Love, holding his torch above 
his curl-crowned head. You miss him, when you 
come up the broad drive from the front gate, 
for Nicholas Jelnik put him in the secretest, 
greenest, sweetest spot in all our garden, and 
you must go down a winding path to find 
him. 

“ So it was n’t an idle tale : they did find it, 
really ! ” breathed Miss Hopkins, staring with 
all her eyes. And I knew with great certainty 
why she had come to Hynds House that after- 
noon. 

“ Forgotten all these many years, and now 
here, like the dead come to life ! ” murmured 
Mrs. Haile, abstractedly. “ How strange ! ” 

“It was said he bought it for his mother, be- 
cause it looked so like himself as a child,” said 
Miss Hopkins. Then she remembered her duty, 
held up two fingers before her eyes, and squinted 
through them critically: 

“Charming, but don’t you think the pose 
strained? It ’s an example of eighteenth-century 


“ THY NEIGHBOR AS THYSELF ” 101 


work, placid enough, but it lacks that plastic, 
fluidic serenity, that divine new touch of truth, 
that is revivifying art since the great Rodin 
lighted the torch anew.” 

Heaven knows what else she said. It sounded 
like a paper on art to me, and I have a terror 
of papers on art. They are, Alicia informs me, 
purple piffle. Yet Alicia drank in every word 
Miss Hopkins uttered, though the dimple came 
and went in her cheek. 

“ You seem interested in art, Miss Gaines.” 
Having torn the poor little peasant Love to 
tatters, Miss Hopkins descended to us ground- 
lings. 

“ I don’t always seem to know what art is,” 
admitted Alicia, dovelike. 

The lady who “ moved among us clothed in 
white samite ” smiled encouragingly. 

“ That is because you are really little more" 
than a child,” she said kindly. “ When you be- 
gin to grow, you will improve your mind.” 

Alicia puckered her brows. “ Ah, but I ’m 
Irish ! ” she said, seriously, “ and the Irish hate 
to have to improve their minds. I imagine it 
takes an able-bodied mind to stand intensive 
cultivation,” she added, guilelessly. 

Miss Hopkins smiled: it was a masterpiece, 
that smile! 

“ But why, may I ask, did you choose such 


102 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


a situation for the statue?” she inquired criti- 
cally. “ Now, / should never dream of tucking 
it in such an out-of-the-way place ! ” 

The pucker came back to Alicia’s brow. 

“ Should n’t you?” she wondered. “I shall 
make a point of mentioning that to Mr. Nicholas 
Jelnik, if you don’t mind. You see, he chose that 
spot, and we rather like it, ourselves.” 

Miss Hopkins stopped dead short, and Mrs. 
Haile started in spite of herself. Evidently, the 
situation was beyond them. Didn’t we know ? 
How much had Judge Gatchell seen fit to tell 
us? Alicia had dropped a bomb-shell that be- 
fore night would detonate in every house in 
Hyndsville. They have n’t very much to talk 
about in small towns, except one another, and 
when a plump mouse of gossip frisks about 
whisking his tail, why, it is cat nature to pounce 
upon it. 

“ Mr. J elnik ! ” said Miss Hopkins, with an 
accent. “ Oh, I see. Well — he is a neighbor, 
of course. Certainly if Mr. Jelnik selected that 
particular spot for the statue — he of all people 
has the best right to do so — and to have his 
wishes considered.” 

“Of course. He has lived abroad, and seen 
everything of art there is to see,” Alicia agreed, 
placidly. Which wasn’t at all what Miss Hop- 
kins meant. 


“ thy neighbor AS THYSELF ” 103 


We could see those two women turning the 
thing over and over in their minds — Nicholas 
Jelnik, last heir and descendant of Richard 
Hynds, tactily (perhaps even gladly; for had 
they not just witnessed the behavior of Doctor 
Richard Geddes?) accepting the interlopers in 
the house of his fathers ! Nicholas Jelnik select- 
ing the site for the statue Richard had brought 
home in pride, and Freeman had buried in sor- 
row ! Miss Hopkins’s stare dismissed me, shifted 
to Alicia, and discovered the cause of this shame- 
less surrender of family pride. Her lips tight- 
ened. With politely cold hopes that we should 
like Hyndsville, and warmer hopes that we would 
join the missionary society, they left us. 

“ Wedge Number One : The poor dear heathen, 
Sophy!” smiled Alicia. “ The P.D.H. can be a 
very present help in times of social trouble, can’t ^ 
he? I shall attend that missionary meeting, and 
take stock. Incidentally (For goodness’ sake, 
don’t look so scandalized, Sophy Smith! this is 
a fight for our lives, so to speak!) incidentally, 
I shan’t do the P.D.H. any harm. He won’t be 
a bit worse than he was before, which is promis- 
ing.” She put two fingers before her laughing 
eyes, squinted through them, and drawled: 

“ You lack subtlety, Miss Smith. Cultivate 
your imagination, my dear!” in Miss Hopkins’s 
best voice. 


104 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


Riedriech stuck his grizzled head out at a 
window, cautiously: 

“ Fraulein, she hass gone? ” And seeing that 
the coast was clear, he added, vehemently : 
“ Cultivate the mindt ! Cultivate the imatchina- 
tion ! Achy lieher Gott! Dornroschen, cultivate 
you the heart. It iss not what the woman thinks, 
but what she loves, what she feels, which makes 
of the world a home-place for men und kinder ” 
The good old Jew nodded his head vigorously 
at the girl, smiled, and went back to his work. 
And Schmetz came and finished the bulb bed 
by covering it carefully with two thicknesses 
of chicken-wire. 

That night, just before we went up-stairs, I 
went into the library after Freeman Hynds’s 
diary, which we were simply burning to read. 
I opened the table drawer in which I had placed 
it. The drawer was quite empty. The little 
flat book was gone. 


CHAPTER VI 


GLAMOURY 



LICIA insisted that we were living in a 


ii fairy-story, and had better enjoy every 
shining minute while it lasted. But, as I pointed 
out, the cost of restoring Hynds House was 
appallingly real, so real that it left a big, big 
hole in the bank-account. It is true that we 
who never really had had a home since we were 
little children, and then the most modest sort, 
had gotten such a home as comes to but few. \ 
But — one does n’t get something for nothing! 

We had done our part for Hynds House; now 
Hynds House had to do its part for us. It had 
to earn its keep, and ours. We had known that 
from the beginning, and Alicia mapped out the 
entire plan of how it was to be done ; a plan which 
I at first looked upon as the fairy-storiest part 
of the whole thing! 

To-night we sat facing each other across the 
library table, with a great pile of receipted bills 
between us, the total of which made me feel 


105 


106 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


pale. Alicia, however, was cheerfully figuring 
away on her own hook ; and presently she shoved 
a list of addresses across to me. 

The first two were the head of our old firm, 
and the one celebrity I had ever seen or spoken 
to, a novelist and lecturer with record-breaking 
best sellers to his account. He once had some 
business dealings with our firm, and I attended 
to the details, thereby winning his cantankerous 
approval. He had very bad manners, of which 
he was totally unashamed, and very good 
morals, of which he was somewhat doubtful, as 
they did n’t smack of genius ; a notion that he 
was a superior sort of Sherlock Holmes, having 
the truffle-hound’s flair for discovering and fol- 
lowing up clews and unraveling mysteries, most 
of which did n’t exist outside of his own eager 
mind; and such a genuine passion for old and 
beautiful things as Balzac had. It was upon this 
last foundation that Alicia was building. 

“ He has written that the average wealthy mod- 
ern home is a combination of Pullman Palace Car 
and Gehenna. And that the so-called crime 
wave which sweeps recurrently over American 
cities, is very likely nothing more than the in- 
evitable reaction of our damnable house decora- 
tions upon our immature intellects.” Alicia re- 
peated it dreamily. “ I have chosen for him the 
upper southwestern room with the sunset effeet 


GLAMOURY 


107 


and the pineapple four-poster. It has a claw- 
footed desk.of block mahogany, three hand-carved 
walnut chairs, two Rembrandt prints, and a 
French prie-dieu with a purple velvet cover em- 
broidered with green and gold swastikas. He 
has a purple soul with gold tassels on it, himself, 
Sophy, and he should be willing to pay a thump- 
ing price for it. That room is w T orth at least two 
lectures and one best seller, not to mention what 
he T1 get out of the rest of the house.” 

“ First catch your hare/’ I reminded her skep- 
tically. 

“ First set your trap, and you can reckon on 
hare nature to do the rest. A few good photo- 
graphs of this house, along with the information 
that it runs back to the beginning of things' 
American and has never been exploited, will 
fetch him at a hand-gallop. Add a hint that we 
have our own brand of family spook, and you 
could n’t keep him away if you tried. The only 
trouble is that he may walk off with your brass 
tongs up his trouser-leg, or a print or two tucked 
under his shirt.” 

We had decided that we would have a series of 
photographs of the house, with all particularly 
good points stressed; such as, say, the library 
fireplace, the fan-light window at the end of the 
upper hall, the pillared front porch, and a corner 
of the drawing-room. 


108 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


Also — and this was the great thing, calling 
for a heavy outlay — we would advertise in some 
two or three of the ultra periodicals, the adver- 
tisement to carry a stunning little cut of our 
front porch. We decided to run the risk of 
expending more money than we could really af- 
ford, because the people that advertisement was 
meant to attract would in the long run pay for it. 

“ Our prices will be predacious, piratical, pro- 
hibitive, and profitable. We shall stop just this 
side of highway robbery. Therefore our de- 
mands will be cheerfully, nay, willingly met ; and 
everybody, including you and me, Sophy, will be 
satisfied and happy ! ” 

“Boarders! ” said I, limply, “boarders — in 
Hynds House ! ” 

“ Perish the thought ! We have possibly the 
most interesting and beautiful old house in 
America. It’s one of the few really historic 
houses left in the whole South. It has seen the 
Indians, it has seen the British, it has seen Sher- 
man’s men, and escaped them all. Well, then, 
we propose to allow certain of the elect, who can 
afford it, to come and live in Hynds House for a 
while. They will be willing to pay a round sum 
for the privilege. That ’s all.” 

“Oh, is it, indeed! And will they?” 

“ Won’t they, though ! ” Alicia spoke confi- 
dently. “Now draft me a letter to the Head, 


GLAMOURY 


109 


setting forth the many reasons why himself, his 
wife, their car, and her Chow, can’t afford to 
miss Hynds House on their trip South this sea- 
son. You might explain that Mary Magdalen 
is our cook, and the Queen of Sheba our hand- 
maid. Also, please help me decide in which of 
these magazines we had better advertise first.” 

“But the cost!” I wailed. “We have spent 
so sinfully much already ! And the place is eat- 
ing its head off, with nothing coming in. Since 
I took down those bill-boards, actually the price 
of that Lafayette Street lot has gone down. No- 
body seems anxious to buy it any more.” 

“ Change your mind about selling it ; hint that 
you ’re considering an ice-cream parlor and a 
movie theater,” said the girl who ’d been the 
worst file-clerk. “ In the meantime, Sophy, you 
have sense enough to understand that we ’ve 
spent so much money we ’ve got to spend more 
to get some of it back. — I vote we start in this 
one, Sophy,” and she laid her finger upon the 
most expensive and ultra of all the magazines! 

“ But that is for millionaires! ” said I, aghast. 

“ So is Hynds House,” insisted Alicia, coolly. 
“ How much did you say was in the bank? ” 

I was afraid to hear my own voice mention 
that insignificant sum ; for, when one considered 
Hynds House, the little we had was beggarly; 
so I wrote it down, and pushed the paper across 


■110 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


to her. Instead of looking scared, Alicia Gaines 
looked delighted ! 

“All that?” And round chin on pink palm, 
she fell to studying me with as much curiosity as 
if she had just met me and were puzzled to get at 
the real Me. Then she nodded, and snatching a 
sheet of paper, began to figure again, pausing 
every now and then to regard me with slitted 
eyes. At the end of ten strenuous minutes she 
pushed the paper over to me, and watched me 
grow all but apoplectic as I studied it. It was 
an entertaining list, beginning with a hat and 
ending with silk stockings. With all sorts of 
wonderful things in between — for me, you un- 
derstand. Things like “ One brown frock, with 
something cloudy -yellow about it.” (“Sophy, 
blondes can stand yellow wonderfully well; I 
suggest a bronze, instead of a duller brown.”) 

“ Why, I have plenty of clothes ! ” I pro- 
tested. 

“ Business-woman-of-a-certain-age, general- 
utility, wil 1-stand- wear-and-tear clothes. Not a 
stitch of Hyndshousey clothes among them. 
No happy , glad-I ’m-alive-and-a woman clothes. 
Here’s where you cease to lo'ok merely useful, 
respectable, and responsible, and begin to look 
the Lady of the Castle. There ’s quite as much 
philosophy and good morals in looking like a 
butterfly as there is in resembling a caterpillar.” 


GLAMOURY 111 

“ Why should I have more clothes? ” I de- 
manded. 

“ Because.” And she added, with a fleeting 
smile, “ And then catch your hare.” 

“ Alicia ! ” said I, scandalized. “ Alicia 

Gaines, do you realize I am thirty-six years old? ” 

“ You would n’t be if you just had sense enough 
to forget to remember it.” This resentfully. 

“ No? Would you mind telling me how I 
might become such an accomplished forgetter? ” 

“ Why, there ’s nothing easier ! When you 
really wish to forget to remember something, 
Sophy, all you have to do is to remember to for- 
get it ! ” And then, with real earnestness : 
“ Sophy, it ’s the better part of wisdom to look 
like the job you want to hold down. Your job 
is holding down Hynds House. And we are up 
against things, Sophy, you and I. We have got 
to win out because it means — all this.” Her 
eyes swept over the beautiful old room with an 
immense pride and affection. 

“We have just got to keep Hynds House, if 
only to teach these Hyndsville women a lesson.” 
She spoke after a pause. “ Sophy, they flatten 
their ears and arch their backs at sight of us ; and 
whenever there ’s a good chance for a wipe of 
a paw, why, we catch it across the nose. Now 
I,” she admitted frankly, “ am naturally full of 
cat feelings myself. I will not do vdiat you 


112 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


want to do — walk off looking aggrieved, after 
the fashion of Old Dog Tray. I will repay in 
kind, retaliate in true lady-cat manner. And 
these,” — she began to smile — “ these shall be our 
weapons of offense and defense. It will be a 
gorgeous struggle; however, my forebears came 
from Kilkenny ! ” 

I laughed, but indeed I did not feel any too 
optimistic. Holding down Hynds House was no 
easy task, and the town was not disposed to make 
it easier for us. While we had been busy reno- 
vating, while our hands were so full of work that 
every minute was occupied, we hadn’t felt our 
isolation. It was only when we had time to 
pause and look around us, that the stubborn, 
quiet hostility of the town’s attitude to the new 
owner of Hynds House was borne in upon us. 

Not that anything overt was done by any one. 
Nor was there the slightest breach of politeness: 
they were as punctiliously polite when chance 
brought us into contact with them, as well-bred 
folk are to strangers whose further acquaintance 
they have no desire to cultivate. The vestrymen 
of St. Polycarp’s had expressed their apprecia- 
tion of Miss Smith’s action in promptly drop- 
ping the suit against them; she was welcome to 
come and worship God in their church, and to 
do her duty by the heathen. Such ladies as hap- 
pened to belong to the missionary society spoke 


GLAMOURY 


113 


to us pleasantly in the church vestibule. The 
minister and his wife were as sincerely, dute- 
ously courteous. But that was all. Not a house 
in Hyndsville opened its doors to us. They sim- 
ply would not accept the interloper that the ma- 
lignity of the Scarlett Witch had put in posses- 
sion of that which should have gone back to 
Richard’s last heir, or failing him, to Richard 
Geddes. 

The fact that these two descendants of the 
Hyndses did not seem to see and do their duty as 
members of that illustrious family, but shame- 
lessly made friends with the aliens, did not raise 
us in the town’s estimation. Quite the con- 
trary. Nor were they even faintly angry with 
Mr. Jelnik and Doctor Geddes, who were, so to 
say, unsuspicious Israelites coaxed into the 
Canaanitish camp. 

I admit that I considered Doctor Richard 
Geddes undiplomatic in his behavior. It never 
once occurred to that lordly gentleman, who had 
had his own way ever since he was born, that he 
should stop now to consider the feelings or the 
prejudices of Hyndsville. It wasn’t that he 
meant to champion us. It never occurred to him 
that we needed championing. He simply liked 
us because he liked us. We pleased him. That 
sufficed, so far as he was concerned. 

I had begun really to like the doctor, myself. 


114 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


But I wished to heaven he were n’t, at that 
critical time, so tactless. For instance, I have 
been peremptorily taken by an elbow and led 
willy-nilly to his waiting car, on Lafayette 
Street, which is our principal thoroughfare, 
under the calm, appraising, watching eyes of all 
feminine Hyndsville. Not one of whom would 
fail to remark, casually: 

“ Oh, did you see that Miss Smith with Doctor 
Geddes this morning? Men are so unsuspicious, 
are n’t they ! ” 

I could n’t explain the situation to him, of 
course, any more than I could explain to Mr. 
Nicholas Jelnik that his presence in Hynds 
House, while pleasing to us, was disquieting and 
displeasing to others. 

It was to be expected that this handsome 
young man, who kept his affairs so strictly to 
himself that nobody knew anything about them, 
should arouse the avid curiosity and hold the 
breathless interest of a little town where every- 
body had always known everybody else’s busi- 
ness. 

Why had he come to Hyndsville? To find the 
Hynds jewels, after a century? Did n’t he know 
that the Scarlett Witch had the eye of an eagle 
for the glitter of gold and would long since have 
discovered whatever of value had been in Hynds 
House? Why didn’t he consult older members 


GLAMQURY 


115 


of the community, who could furnish him 
with immensely interesting side-lights on the 
Hyndses? 

Mr. Jelnik never explained. He didn’t ask 
anybody anything. He did n’t even employ 
Hyndsville negroes, who could be expected to 
gossip : his household consisted of a stately 
bronze-colored man-servant who was reputed to 
be a pagan, and the huge wolf-hound, Boris, 
his constant companion. 

When Doctor Geddes was delicately sounded, 
the big man explained that he himself had but re- 
cently made the acquaintance of his young kins- 
man; Jelnik was a first-rate chap, declared the 
doctor; immensely clever, as befitted his father’s 
son; altogether likeable, but a bit of a lunatic, 
like all the Hyndses. 

It was natural, too, that the young ladies in 
a small town where young men are at a premium 
should have noticed this one particularly and 
expected a like interest on his part. The inex- 
plicable Jelnik failed to exhibit it. There was 
but one house that he visited, and that was 
Hynds House. 

Whatever his reasons for this may have been, 
and the town named several, the fact remains 
that Hynds House would never have been so 
beautiful, the restoration would n’t have been so 
nearly perfect, had it not been for the critical 


116 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


taste of Mr. Jelnik. He had the European 
knowledge of beautiful things, and, toward the 
finer graces of life, the attitude of Paris, of Rome, 
of Vienna, rather than of New York, of Chicago, 
or of, say, Atlanta. 

There was a glamour about the man. What- 
ever he did or said had an indefinable, delight- 
ful significance; what he left undone was full 
of meaning. His mere presence ornamented 
and colored common moments so that they 
glowed, and remained ii. the memory with a 
rainbow light upon them. He was never hur- 
ried or flurried, any more than sun and sky and 
trees and tides are; and he was just as vital, 
and quite as baffling. 

We accepted him at first as part of the fairy- 
story into which Destiny had pitchforked us. 
He belonged to Hynds House, so to speak, and 
there one might meet him upon common ground. 
But sometimes when I happened to glance up I 
would find him watching us with those reflective 
eyes that were so full of light and at the same 
time so inscrutable. And then he would smile, 
his Dionysiac smile that made him all at once so 
far off and so foreign that I knew, with a sinking 
heart, that he did n’t belong at all ; that this beau- 
tiful and brilliant bird of passage was lightening 
for but a very brief space my sober skies. 

Alicia said he made her think of peacocks and 


GLAMOURY 


117 


ivory. He delighted and dazzled her, though he 
did not disquiet her as he did me, perhaps be- 
cause she, too, was young and beautiful, and I 
— was n’t. 

It will be seen, then, that our position, take 
it by and large, was n’t one that called for flags 
and buntings. Life did n’t look a bit rose- 
colored to me as I sat there that night, drafting 
a letter to the Head. Of a sudden arose clamor 
in the hall, and howls, hideously loud at that 
hour and in that quiet house. There came the 
noise of running feet, and there burst into the 
lighted library, with gray faces and rolling eyes, 
our two lately acquired colored maids, Fernolia 
the thin one, and Queen of Sheba, fat and brown. 

“ Good heavens ! What ’s the matter? ” I 
askedj fearfully. It had been a terrible task to 
break in those two handmaids, to train them not 
to take part in the conversation at table, not to 
take off cap, and hair, not to do the thousand 
and one undisciplined and disorderly things they 
did do. 

“ Ghostes ! Sperets ! Ha’nts ! ” chattered the 
colored women. “ OF Mis’ Scarlett ’s walkin’ 
in de ca’iage house ! ” 

“ Nonsense ! ” At the same time I felt my- 
self turning pale, and goose-flesh coming out on 
my spine. 

“No, ma’am, Miss Sophy, ’t ain’t nonsense. 


118 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


It ’s ha’nts ! ” protested Fernolia. She was the 
brighter of the two, but given to embroidering 
her facts. 

“ Yessum, I done saw ’er,” corroborated Queen- 
asheeba. ( That ? s how one pronounced her 
name.) 

The two occupied a very pleasant room above 
the carriage house, a room that had overcome 
their unwillingness to stay overnight at Hynds 
House. Queenasheeba was just dozing, when she 
was awakened by Fernolia, who had been sitting 
by the window. Both of them, peering through 
the scrim curtains, saw a tall white figure disap- 
pear into the spring-house. A few minutes later, 
to their horror, they heard Something moving 
downstairs in the carriage house — Something 
like the clank of a chain — footsteps — and then 
silence. Almost paralyzed with terror, the two 
women clung together. Anything might be ex- 
pected of oT Mis’ Scarlett! However, nothing 
further happened. With shaking hands Queena- 
sheeba relighted the lamp. Then, snatching up 
such clothes as they could grab, the two fled to 
us. 

Mary Magdalen and Beautiful Dog always de- 
parted after dinner. Except for the Black fam- 
ily and the two canaries, Alicia and I had big, 
lonesome Hynds House to ourselves. Mr. Jel- 
nik’s gray cottage, set amid Lombardy poplars 


GLAMOURY 


119 


and thick shrubberies, was some distance away, 
and we did n’t know whether Doctor Geddes was 
at home or not. It is true we had firearms, a 
pair of pistols having been literally forced upon 
us by the doctor, who fretted and fumed about 
our staying there alone. Both of us were more 
afraid of those pistols than of any possible 
ghostly intruder. 

Nevertheless, I went up-stairs and fetched 
them. Alicia took one as she might have taken 
a rattlesnake, and I held the other. Armed 
thus, carrying torch-light and lantern, and with 
the two gray-faced, half-clad negro women fol- 
lowing us, one carrying our brass poker and the 
other the tongs, we marched upon the carriage 
house. 

The big barnlike place, lately cleaned and 
whitewashed, looked painfully empty. In one of 
the stalls the hay purchased for our recently ac- 
quired Jersey eow gave off a pleasant odor. 
Over in one corner, in a neat, clean, orderly 
array, were Schmetz's tools. A little farther on 
was our chicken feed, in covered barrels. 

We went from empty stall to empty stall, to 
reassure the women ; there was n’t so much as 
a cobweb in any of them. All the down-stairs 
windows were heavily barred with iron and fur- 
ther protected, like the doors, with heavy oaken 
shutters studded with iron nail-heads. The two 


120 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


small rooms in the rear had once been used as 
a jail for recalcitrant slaves; they held now 
nothing deadlier than Schmetz’s flower pots and 
seedlings. Every shutter was closed, and the 
iron bars looked reassuringly strong; also, the 
walls are three feet thick. 

“You were dreaming, you silly women! I 
told you you were dreaming ! ” said I, and had 
turned to go, reassured and relieved, when 
Alicia’s nose wrinkled. I could hardly keep 
from sniffing, myself. 

In the carriage-house was a faint, indetermin- 
able scent, the ghost of the ghost of fragrance, 
so elusive that one sensed rather than smelled 
it, so pervasive and haunting that one could not 
miss it. And it certainly had nothing to do with 
the wholesome odor of hay and cow feed, or 
the smell of whitewash and oiled tools. 

“ Yes, you were dreaming.” Alicia began to 
edge the colored women toward the doors. “ But 
as you ’ve had a scare,” she added pleasantly, 
“ I ’ll give you a new lace collar, Queenasheeba, 
and you a red ribbon, Fernolia, to wear to church 
next Sunday, just to prove to you that being 
awake is heaps better than having nightmares.” 

We padlocked the big doors after us, and 
went through the rooms up-stairs. They, too, 
had been freshly cleaned and calcimined. And 
they, too, were quite empty. 


GLAMOURY 


121 


Despite which, Fernolia and Queenasheeba 
were firmly, tearfully, shiveringly certain they 
had seen nothing less than oP Mis’ Scarlett’s 
ha’nt. They had the worst possible opinion of 
ol’ Miss Scarlett: she had been bad enough liv- 
ing — but as a spook! We had to let them lug 
their bedding over and sleep in the room next to 
ours ; we had to give them sweet lavender to quiet 
their nerves. I am sure they would have bolted 
incontinently if they hadn’t been too scared to 
venture outside. 

“ If I could catch that ghost I ’d shake it ! ” de- 
clared Alicia. And we went back to our figuring, 
with a sort of desperate courage. “Now will 
you get those clothes, Sophy Smith ? ” she re- 
sumed, through her teeth, and the pink came 
back to her cheek, and her eyes deepened. “ And 
do you agree to stick it out, you and I shoulder 
to shoulder, town or no town, ha’nts or no 
ha’nts; and win out?” 

“Yes!” said I. 


CHAPTER VII 


A BRIGHT PARTICULAR STAR 

W IRE from The Author, New York City, 
to Miss S. Smith, Hyndsville, South 
Carolina : 

Photos received. Furniture noted. It’s pretty, but is 
it art? 

Wire from Miss Smith to The Author : 

What is Art ? 

Wire from The Author: 

Sometimes an invention of the devil. Is your stuff 
Madison Avenue or Grand Rapids? Reply. 

Wire from Miss Smith : 

Madison Avenue and Grand Rapids hadn’t been in- 
vented when Hynds House was furnished. 

Wire from The Author: 

Maybe not, but mightn’t be same furniture. Have 
been stung before. Can’t be genuine. Too much of it. 

Wire from Miss Smith : 

Please yourself. 


122 


A BRIGHT PARTICULAR STAR 123 

Wire from The Author: 

Coming to investigate. Won’t sleep in anything but 
pineapple bed; won’t sit in anything but carved chair; 
can’t pray without prie-dieu. If spurious will publicly 
gibbet you and probably bum your bouse down. Hold 
southwest room my arrival. 

Alicia laughed, and cuddled those yellow slips. 

“ I knew this was an enchanted place ! ” she 
cried. “ Oh, Sophy, it ’s working! He’s com- 
ing, he ? s coming, and he ’s the biggest ever, and 
he ’s going to stay! Sophy, think of the adver- 
tising ! ” 

“ He will probably be detestable. Geniuses 
are generally horrid to live with. And there 
will be something the matter with his digestion ; 
there is always something the matter with their 
digestion.” 

“ From swallowing all the flattery shoveled 
upon them, poor dears,” Alicia explained char- 
itably. “ Don’t worry about his digestion : leave 
it to Mary Magdalen’s waffles. Hooray ! Hynds 
House stock is booming ! ” 

It was. 

From the head of our firm: 

My dear Miss Smith: 

I have your interesting letter and tbe delightful photo- 
graphs, which have so completely charmed Mrs. Westma- 
cote and me that we have decided it wouldn’t be good 
business to miss Hynds House on our trip South this year. 


124 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


Mrs. Westmacote asks if you could also accommodate a 
cousin of hers, Miss Emmeline Phelps-Parsons, a lady 
deeply interested in the colonial homes of America. 

You must allow me heartily to congratulate you upon 
your great good fortune in falling heir to such a wonder- 
ful old place ; and to wish you many happy and prosperous 
years in it. 

I shall telegraph you when to expect us. With all good 
wishes, 

Yours faithfully, 

GEORGE PEABODY WESTMACOTE. 

Letter from Miss Emmeline Phelps-Parsons, 
of Boston: 

Bear Miss Smith: 

My cousin Mrs. Westmacote, whom I have been visiting, 
showed me your letter and the enchanting photographs of 
your house which you were kind enough to send Mr. West- 
macote. Hynds House is just the one place I have long 
been looking for! — an unspoiled colonial house, with his- 
toric associations! 

It is perfect! I must see with my own eyes those Chel- 
sea figures on your drawing-room mantel, the luster and 
Washington jugs in the dining-room, and the cabinets in 
the hall. 

Sincerely yours, 

EMMELINE PHELPS-PARSONS. 

P. S. I hope it is really true that there is an Influence 
in Hynds House? I do so greatly long to come in con- 
tact with the Occult and the Unknown! 

“ Somewhere on the firing-line of fifty,” mused 
Alicia. “ A lady with a soul. Don’t you hear 


A BRIGHT PARTICULAR STAR 125 


dear old Boston calling yon, Sophy? Here ’s one 
to put Miss Martha Hopkins’s light under a 
bushel basket ! ” 

We had several other inquirers; and chose 
from them Mr. Chetwynd Harrison-Gore and his 
daughter, English folk “ doing ” America and 
delighted to include a Carolina colonial house in 
their trip ; a suffrage leader, whose throat needed 
a rest ; and Morenas, the illustrator. It seemed 
that Hynds House offered to each one something 
that had been craved for. 

The Author pounced upon us two or three 
days before we expected him, to take stock after 
his own fashion. I have heard The Author 
commended for “ the humor of his rare smile and 
the keen, kind intellectuality of his remarkable 
eyes.” Well, the smile was rare enough; and 
of course there is n’t any doubt about the man’s 
intellectuality. For the rest, he proved to be a 
tall, lanky, stooping person, with a thin tanned 
face, outstanding ears, a high nose, and long, 
blue-gray eyes half-hidden under drooping lids 
and behind glasses. His hair was just hair. 
And he had the sort of mustache that bristled 
like a cat’s when he twisted his lip. 

So far as monetary success, and efficacious 
]3ress-agents, and the adulation, admiration, 
emulation, and envy of his contemporaries went, 
he had nothing to complain of. He was lion- 


126 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


ized, quoted, courted, flattered, reviewed, viewed 
through rose-colored spectacles ; and disillu- 
sioned, discontented, cynical, selfish, and, of 
course, most horribly bored. He was gun-shy 
of women; he suspected them of wanting to 
marry him. He was wary of men ; he suspected 
them of wanting to exploit him. He loathed 
children, who were generally obstreperous and 
unnecessary editions of parents he did n’t ad- 
mire. He did n’t even trust the beautiful works 
of men’s hands. They, even they, were too often 
faked ! If you had dug up the indubitable 
mummy of the first Pharaoh from under the 
oldest of the pyramids, The Author would have 
turned him over on his back and hunted for the 
trade-mark of The Modern Mummy-makers : 
London, Paris, and New York; Catalogue on 
Eequest. 

He stalked through Hynds House with slitted 
eyes and bristling mustache — business of silent 
sleuth on the trail of the furniture-fakir ! He ’d 
pause at each door and with an eagle glance 
take a comprehensive survey; then, defensively, 
offensively, he examined things in detail. From 
our rambling attics to our vast and cavernous 
cellars did he go; and not a word crossed his 
lips until he had completed this conandoyley 
examination. Then : 

“ Telegraph form if you have one, please,” he 


A BRIGHT PARTICULAR STAR 127 

requested briefly. “ I wish to wire for my car. 
Put Johnson in the room next mine. Johnson ’s 
my secretary.” He looked at Alicia, reflectively. 
“ Amiable ass, Johnson,” he volunteered. Then 
he went over to the tiled fireplace — we were 
in the library — and bent worshipfully before it. 

“ The finest bit of tile-work on this continent,” 
he said, in a hushed voice. “ Absolutely perfect. 
And it belongs to a woman named Smith ! ” 

“ We know just how you feel about it,” Alicia 
told him sympathetically, while The Author 
turned red to his ears. “ I have often felt like 
that myself, when something I particularly 
wanted was bought by somebody I was sure 
could n’t properly appreciate it. I dare say I 
was mistaken,” admitted Alicia, “just as mis- 
taken as you are now in thinking that Sophy and 
I are n’t worthy of those tiles. We are — all the 
more so because we never before had anything 
like them.” 

The spoiled darling of success looked at us 
intently; and a most curious change came over 
his clever, bad-tempered face. His eyes are as 
bright as ice, and have somewhat the same cold 
light in them. Now a thaw set in and melted 
them, and a mottled red spread over his sallow 
cheeks. 

“ Miss Gaines,” he said, abruptly, “ your doll- 
baby face does your intelligence an injustice. — 


128 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


Miss Smith, I apologize.” And before the aston- 
ished and indignant Alicia could summon a with- 
ering retort, he added heartily : “ This whole 

place is quite the real thing, you know — almost 
too good to be true and too true to be good. 
Would you mind telling me how you happened 
to think of letting me in on it, eh?” 

“ Because we knew it was the real thing,” 
Alicia replied, truthfully. 

“ Do you know,” — The Author was plainly 
pleased — “that that is one of the very nicest 
things that ’s ever been said to me? Because I 
really do know above a bit about genuine stuff.” 

“ It must be a great relief to you to hear some- 
thing pleasant about yourself that is also some- 
thing true,” I said with sympathy. The Author 
grinned like a hyena, and Alicia giggled. “ Be- 
cause you must be bored to extinction, having 
to listen to all sorts of people ascribe to you all 
sorts of virtues that no one man could possibly 
possess and remain human.” I was remember- 
ing some of the fulsome flubdub I ’d read about 
him. 

“ Hark to her ! ” grinned The Author. 
“What! you don’t believe all the nice things 
you ’ve read about me? ” 

“ I do not.” 

“ You don’t in the least look or write like a 


A BRIGHT PARTICULAR STAR 129 


dehumanized saint, you know,” supplemented 
Alicia, laughing. 

“ What do I look like, then? ” He sat on the 
edge of a table and cuddled a bony knee. Be- 
hind his glasses his eyes began to twinkle. 

“ You look more like yourself than you do 
like your photographs,” decided Alicia. 

The Author threw up his hands. 

“And now, tell me this, please: How, when, 
where, and from whom, did you acquire the 
supreme art of aiding and abetting an old house 
to grow young again without losing its char- 
acter? ” 

“ We were born,” Alicia explained, “ w T ith the 
inherent desire to do just w T hat we have been able 
to do here. This house gave us our big chance. 
But it wouldn’t have been so — so in keeping 
with itself,” she was feeling for the right words, 
“if it hadn’t been for Mr. Nicholas Jelnik.” 

The Author pricked up his intellectual ears. 
His eyes narrowed. 

“ Jelnik? I knew a Jelnik, an Austrian alien- 
ist; met him at dinner at the American Am- 
bassador’s in Vienna; quiet, unassuming, pleas- 
ant man, and one of the greatest doctors in 
Europe.” 

“Mr. Jelnik is Doctor Jelnik’s son.” 

“ What ! ” shrieked The Author. And with 


130 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


unfeigned amazement : “ In the name of high 

heaven, what is Jelnik’s son doing here f” 

“ Mr. Jelnik’s mother was a Miss Hynds. She 
met and married your doctor abroad.” 

That sixth sense possessed by him to an un- 
usual degree, warned him that he was on the 
trail of Copy. 

“ May I ask questions? ” he demanded. 

“ Of course.’’ 

“ You inherited this property from an old 
aunt, I believe? ” 

“ She was n’t my aunt, really. She married 
my mother’s uncle, Johnny Scarlett.” 

“ I see. And Jelnik’s mother was a Miss 
Hynds. How long has he been here? ” 

“ For some time before we came.” 

“ Near neighbor of yours? ” 

“ Yes,” Alicia put in ; “ and Doctor Kichard 
Geddes is our neighbor on the other side. His 
grandmother was a Miss Hynds.” 

“ Pardon a writer-man’s curiosity,” begged 
The Auther, smiling. “ But this house is un- 
usual, very unusual. While I am here I shall 
look up its history. It should make good copy.” 

Having a pretty shrewd idea of The Author’s 
powers of finding out what he wanted to find 
out, we thought it better that he should hear 
that history, as we knew it. If the mystery had 
ever been solved, the tragedy of Hynds House 


A BRIGHT PARTICULAR STAR 131 


would have had but passing interest for The 
Author. But the undiscovered piqued and 
puzzled him and aroused his combative egotism. 

From the pictured face of Freeman — dark, 
stern, uncommunicative — he trotted back to the 
drawing room to look again at the boyish face of 
little Richard leaning against his pretty mother’s 
knees; at the haughty, handsome face of James 
Hampden; and at beautiful dark Jessamine, who 
had a long black curl straying across the shoul- 
der of a blue frock, and a curled red lip, and a 
breast of snow. 

“ Freeman was not a crook ; his face is hard, 
stern, bigoted, secretive, but honest. Yet if he 
did n’t do it himself what was he trying to tell 
when death cut off his wind? If he did it, where 
did he hide the plunder? Here in this house? 
His family must have known every nook and 
cranny as well as he did himself, and he could 
be sure they ’d pull it to pieces in the search that 
would ensue. 

“ If Richard were the thief, to whom did he 
give the loot? If the gems had been put upon the 
market, some trace of them must have been dis- 
covered. Remains: Who got them? Where did 
they go? ” 

“ That ’s what the unhappy people in this house 
asked a century ago, and there was no answer,” 
I remarked, soberly. 


132 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


“And that poor woman Jessamine went mad 
trying to solve it ! ” he said, looking at her with 
commiseration. And after a pause : “ And so 

the lady who left her husband’s grandniece the 
house of her forebears was Freeman’s daughter : 
and the Austrian doctor’s son is Richard’s great- 
great-grandson ! I meet Jelnik pere in Vienna, 
and come to Hyndsville, South Carolina, to meet 
Jelnik fils. H’m ! Decidedly, the situation has 
nice possibilities ! ” 

Whereupon he took note-book and fountain- 
pen from his coat pocket and in the most com- 
posed manner began to jot down the outstanding 
features of Hynds House history. 

“It will give me something to puzzle over 
while I ’m here,” he remarked, complacently. It 
did! 

The Author approved of Hynds House. It had 
all the charm of a new and quaint field of explora- 
tion and research, and there was nothing in 
it to offend his hypercritical judgment. I have a 
shrewd suspicion that Mary Magdalen’s cooking 
played no mean part in his satisfaction. His 
prowess as a trencherman aroused the admira- 
tion and respect of Fernolia, who waited on table. 
Femolia had learned to admire herself in her 
smart apron and cap, and to serve creditably 
enough. Only twice did she fall from grace; 
once was the morning The Author broke his own 


A BRIGHT PARTICULAR STAR 133 


record for waffles. Fernolia, excited and aston- 
ished, placed the last platter before him, raised 
the cover with a flourish, and remarked with deep 
meaning : 

“ Deni ’ s all! ” 

The second time was when we had what Mary 
Magdalen calls “ mulatto rice,” which is a dish 
built upon a firm foundation of small strips of 
bacon, onion, stewed tomatoes, and rice, and a 
later and last addition of deliciously browned 
country sausages. Fernolia, beaming upon The 
Author hospitably, broke her parole : 

“ You ain’t called to skimp yo’self none on dat 
rice,” she told him confidentially. “ De cook 
done put yo’ name in de pot big. She say she 
glad we-all got man in de house to ’preciate vit- 
tles. Yes -suh, Ma’y Magdalen aim to make you 
bust yo’ buttonholes whilst you hab de chanst.” 

I am told that The Author always makes a 
great hit when he tells that on himself, and is 
considered tremendously clever because he can 
imitate Fernolia’s soft South Carolina drawl. 

Mr. Nicholas Jelnik, whom he managed to meet 
within the week, aroused The Author’s profes- 
sional interest. For once his tried and tested 
powers of turning other people’s minds inside out 
failed utterly. His innocent-sounding queries, 
his adroit leads, were smilingly turned aside. 
The defense, so far as Mr. Jelnik was concerned, 


134 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


was ridiculously simple : lie did n’t want to talk 
about himself and he did n’t do it. 

He was perfectly willing to talk, when the 
humor seized him, and he did talk, brilliantly, 
wittily, freely, and impersonally. The egoistic 
“ I ” was conspicuous by its absence. And while 
he talked you could see the agile antennae of The 
Author’s winged mind feeling after the soul- 
string that might lead him through the mazes of 
this unusual character. That he could be deftly 
diverted filled The Author with chagrin mingled 
with wonder. 

He manoeuvered for an invitation to the gray 
cottage and secured it with suspicious ease; 
called, and had a glass of most excellent w T ine in 
his host’s simplest of bachelor living-rooms; 
made the closer acquaintance of Boris — he 
did n’t care for dogs — and of self-contained, 
dark-faced Daoud, Mr. Jelnik’s East Indian man- 
servant; and came home dissatisfied and deter- 
mined. He scented “ copy,” and a born writer 
after copy is, next to an Apache after a scalp or a 
Dvak after his enemy’s head, the most ruthless 
of created beings. He will pick his mother’s 
naked soul to pieces, bore into his wife’s living 
brain, dissect his daughter’s quivering heart, tear 
across his sister’s mind, rip up his father’s life 
and his best friend’s character, lay bare the tomb 
itself, and make for himself an ink of tears and 


A BRIGHT PARTICULAR STAR 135 


blood that he may write what he finds. Of such 
is the kingdom of Genius. 

And in the meantime the wondrous news that 
The Author himself was staying at Hynds House, 
percolated through Hyndsville and soaked to the 
bone. The Author was too big a figure to be ig- 
nored, even by South Carolina people. Some- 
thing had to be done. But how shall one become 
acquainted with a notoriously unfriendly and 
gun-shy celebrity, a personage of such note that 
every utterance means newspaper space ; and at 
the same time manage utterly to ignore and cast 
into outer darkness the people with whom the 
great one is staying? 

The town felt itself put upon its mettle. The 
first move was made by Miss Martha Hopkins. 
It was understood that if anybody could clear the 
way, carry a difficult position with skill and 
aplomb, that somebody was Miss Martha Hop- 
kins. 

She didn’t bear down directly upon The Au- 
thor: that would have been crude. She opened 
her campaign by a flank movement upon Alicia 
and me, in her capacity of secretary and treasurer 
of the missionary society. 

Miss Hopkins sailed into Hynds House on a 
perfect afternoon, to discuss with us a proposed 
rummage-sale which was to benefit the heathen. 
She was n’t really worrying about the heathen : 


136 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


lie had all the rest of his benighted life to get him- 
self saved in, had n’t he? All the while she sat 
there and talked about him, she was really loaded 
to the muzzle with pertinent remarks to affluent 
authors. 

She had come with the hope of chancing upon 
the great man himself; and, failing that, she 
meant to pump Alicia and me of enough material 
to, say, enable her to use a part of her stock of pet 
adjectives in the paper she would prepare for the 
next meeting of the literary society. She had a 
pretty stock of adjectives — plump, purple words 
like lyric, and liquid, and plastic, and subtile, and 
poignancy, with every now and then a chiaoscuro 
thrown in for good measure; and a whole melt- 
ing-pot full of “ rare emotional experiences,” 
“ art that was almost intuitive in its passion, so 
subtly did it ” — oh, do all sorts of things ! — 
and “ handling the plastic outlines of the theme 
with rare emotional skill and mastery of tech- 
nique,” “ purest lyricism lifted to heights of 
poignancy,” — all that sort of stuff, you know. 
Next time a writer, or, better still, a fiddler or a 
pianist comes to your town, look in your home 
paper the morning after, and you ’ll see it. 

As it happened, The Author was not at home. 
His secretary had arrived a day or two before, 
and after unloading a systemful of copy upon 


A BRIGHT PARTICULAR STAR 137 


that faithful beast of burden, The Author had 
given himself a half-holiday with old Riedriech, 
who knew quite enough about old furniture to 
win his interest and affection. 

Miss Hopkins, then, had Alicia and me to her- 
self. Sedately we discussed rummage-sales, and 
the effect of cotton shirts upon the adolescent 
cannibal; and all the while Miss Hopkins was 
stealthily watching doors and windows and hop- 
ing that high heaven would send The Author to 
her hands. We had n’t so much as mentioned his 
name. It pleased us to sit there and watch her 
trying to make us do so. 

The iron knocker on the front door sounded. 
And ushered in by Queenasheeba, there stood 
Nicholas Jelnik with great gray Boris beside 
him, and beauty and glamour and romance upon 
him like a light. Miss Hopkins had seen him on 
the streets, but hadn’t met him personally. I 
don’t think she relished the fact that she had to 
come to Hynds House to do so. Nor could she 
save herself from the crudity of staring with all 
her eyes at this handsome offshoot of the 
Hyndses, with what in a less polite person might 
well have been called avid curiosity. 

“Miss Leetchy,” (he had gaily borrowed Fer- 
nolia’s pronunciation of Alicia’s name), “ I have 
brought you the butter-scotch your soul hankers 


138 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


after. I fear you can never hope to grow up, 
Miss Leetchy, while you cherish a jejune passion 
for butter-scotch.” 

u Oh, I don’t know. It might have been 
fudge ! ” Alicia replied airily. “ But thank you, 
Mr. Jelnik : it was very nice of you to remember.” 

“ Yes. I have such an excellent memory,” said 
he, blandly. “ Miss Smith, this preserved ginger 
is laid at your shrine. If you offer me a piece or 
two, I shall accept with thanks : I like preserved 
ginger, myself. — Boris, you ’ll prefer butter- 
scotch. You may ask Miss Gaines to give you a 
piece.” 

Miss Hopkins, it appeared, despised butter- 
scotch, and abhorred preserved ginger. 

“ I saw The Author hiking across lots a while 
since. Nice, open-hearted, neighborly man, The 
Author. — Oh ? by the way, Miss Smith : is it, or is 
it not written in the Book of Darwin that the 
gadfly is one of the distinct evolutionary links in 
the descent of man? ” 

“ Good heavens, certainly not ! ” cried Miss 
Hopkins. And she looked strangely upon Mr. 
Nicholas Jelnik. 

“No? Thank you. I was in doubt,” mur- 
mured Mr. Jelnik. The golden flecks danced in 
and out of his eyes. “ But we were speaking of 
The Author : may I ask how The Author appeals 
to you as a human being, Miss Hopkins? ” 


A BRIGHT PARTICULAR STAR 139 


“ I do not know him as a human being/’ Miss 
Hopkins admitted. 

Mr. Jelnik looked surprised. His eyebrows 
went up. 

“ Oh, come, now ! ” he demurred. “ He is n’t 
so bad as all that! ” 

“ Oh, dear me, no ! ” Alicia protested, in a 
shocked voice. “ He may have abrupt manners 
and say unexpected things, but he is perfectly re- 
spectable, Miss Hopkins ! There ’s never been a 
breath against his character. I thought you 
knew,” purred the hussy, demurely. “ Why, he ’s 
dined at the White House, and lunched and mo- 
tored and yachted with royalties, and lectured 
before the D. A. R.’s themselves! And he be- 
longs to at least a dozen societies. There are,” 
— Alicia was enjoying her naughty self im- 
mensely — “ good authors and bad authors. 
Sometimes the bad authors are good, and some- 
times the good authors are bad. But our author 
is more than either : he ’s It ! ” 

“ You entirely and strangely misunderstand 
me.” Miss Hopkins spoke with the deadly 
gentleness of suppressed fury. “ I had no 
slightest intention of reflecting upon the char- 
acter of so eminent a writer, with whose career, 
Miss Gaines, I am thoroughly familiar. I was 
merely trying to explain that I had never met 
him.” 


140 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


“ Oh, I see. Of course ! I should have remem- 
bered that ! ” 

Miss Hopkins’s entire contempt for Alicia’s 
mentality overcame any suspicion she might have 
entertained. Also, she had come determined to 
discover what she could about The Author, and 
she was not one lightly to be put aside. She said, 
smiling tolerantly : 

“ Of course you should ! But may n’t I con- 
gratulate you upon knowing him? Having him 
here in Hynds House almost justifies turning 
the old place into a boarding-house, doesn’t 
it?” 

u The Author,” Mr. Jelnik remarked gently, 
“ has a very sensitive soul. I shudder to think 
what the effect upon him would be were he to 
hear himself referred to as a boarder. My dear 
Miss Hopkins, never, never let him hear you des- 
ignate him ‘ boarder ’ ! ” 

“ Who ’s talking about boarders? ” asked a 
hearty voice, and Doctor Richard Geddes came 
in like a gale of mountain air. 

“ Miss Hopkins. She thinks The Author’s 
presence almost justifies the turning of Hynds 
House into a boarding-house,” answered Mr. Jel- 
nik. He added, thoughtfully, “ Curious notion ; 
is n’t it? ” 

“ Martha has plenty more,” said the doctor, 
bluntly. “ Boarding-house? Well, supposing? 


A BRIGHT PARTICULAR STAR 141 


What was it before? A hyena-cage, Martha, a 
hyena-cage, into which you ’d be the last to ven- 
ture your nose, my dear woman ! I say, put on 
your bonnets, all of you, and let ’s have a spin in 
the fresh air. The roads are gorgeous. You can 
come too, Jelnik : there ’s room for five.” 

Mr. Jelnik was desolated: he had a pressing 
engagement. Miss Hopkins rose precipitately. 
She also had an engagement; besides, she liked to 
walk. People needed to walk more than they 
did. The reason why one saw so many bad 
figures nowadays, was that people lolled around 
in automobiles instead of walking. 

“Well, walking is certainly good for you, 
Martha. It helps you to reduce,” the doctor 
agreed. Miss Hopkins said dryly that the little 
walking she intended to do just then would n’t 
affect her weight any. And that Doctor Geddes 
should himself take to walking : men always got 
fat as they neared fifty. 

“ Fat ! Fifty ! ” roared the doctor, with en- 
raged astonishment. “ Why, I ’m not by some 
years as old as you are, Martha! You were sev- 
eral classes ahead of me in school, don’t you re- 
member? I am exactly thirty-nine years old, 
and as you know everything else, you ought to 
know that ! ” 

Miss Hopkins studied him with a balefully 
level eye. 


142 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


“ You really can’t blame anybody for forget- 
ting it, Richard,” she said, ambiguously. 

“You are to recollect, Geddes, that a woman 
is always as young as she looks,” (Mr. Jelnik 
bowed, smilingly, to Miss Hopkins ) , “ and a man 
no older than he feels,” he added, for the doctor’s 
benefit. 

“ All right. Let ’s say I feel as good as Mar- 
tha looks,” the doctor’s momentary ill humor 
vanished. Miss Hopkins smiled. She had stuck 
her claws into him and drawn blood ; but her fur 
was still ruffled. 

Mr. Jelnik made his adieus, Boris offering each 
of us a polite paw. 

“ And now,” the doctor ordered briskly, “ to 
your spinning, jades, to your spinning ! Into my 
car, the three-of you! No, Martha, I will not 
take a refusal ; you shall not walk : you ’ve got to 
come along, if I have to tuck you under my arm. 
I don’t care if you never reduce. What do you 
want to reduce for, anyhow? You ’re all right 
just as you are ! There ! are you satisfied? ” 

We stood by passively while the masterful doc- 
tor heckled and hustled the unhappy Center of 
Culture into his car. With heaven knows what 
feelings, she found herself seated beside me, 
Sophy Smith, while Alicia, beside the doctor, 
tossed gay remarks over her shoulder. Miss 
Hopkins realized that all Hyndsville would wit- 


A BRIGHT PARTICULAR STAR 143 


ness what she herself knew to be high-handed 
capture by force, but which must hideously re- 
semble capitulation; and she also realized that 
explanations never explain. 

I respected her misery enough to keep silent, 
and she made no attempt to converse. Her hat 
slid forward at a rakish angle over one ear, and 
her hair blew about her face in stringy wisps, as 
the doctor broke the speed laws on the long, level 
stretches of quiet roads. When we came to a 
rough spot she bounced up and down (one might 
hear her breath exhaled in a — well, yes, in a 
grunt) but she made no complaint, uttered no 
protest. She was a shackled and voiceless 
victim, until we finally drew up at her own 
gate, after an hour’s jaunt, and allowed her to 
escape. 

“ Why, Martha, our little spin has given you a 
fine color!” remarked the doctor, genuinely 
pleased. Two conspicuously red spots shone in 
Miss Hopkins’s cheeks, and her eyes were ex- 
tremely bright. “ We ’ll have to take you out 
with us again,” he added, genially. 

“ Shall you, Richard? ” muttered Miss Hop- 
kins, and scuttled up her front path, 

Like one who in a lonesome wood 
Doth walk in fear and dread, 

Because he knows a frightful fiend 
Doth close behind him tread! 


144 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


By and large, I should say that the honors were 
with Alicia. 

The Author’s secretary was pacing up and 
down the garden when we reached home, with 
Potty Black careering after him and every now 
and then dashing into the shrubbery to put to 
flight Beautiful Dog, wdio was also enamored of 
the young man with the nice smile and the good 
brown eyes. He had a great affection for ani- 
mals, as they seemed to understand. 

Beautiful Dog laid aside, for his sake, his fear 
of white people, and slunk after him fawningly, 
wagging what did duty as a tail, and showing 
every tooth in an ear-to-ear grin. At sight of us, 
Beautiful Dog gave a dismal yelp and disap- 
peared. 

“ Let ’s sit in the library,” coaxed the secre- 
tary. “ I want you please to allow me to hold in 
my hands your copy of ‘ Purchas his Pilgrimes.’ 
The Author dreams about that book out loud. 
Oh, yes, another thing I want to ask you : what 
sort of perfume do you use, and where do you get 
it?” 

My scalp prickled. 

“ I noticed it in the upper hall last night,” 
went on the secretary, innocently. “ It was per- 
vasive, but at the same time so delicate, so elu- 
sive, that I couldn’t determine what it was. I 
am very sensitive to perfumes.” 


A BRIGHT PARTICULAR STAR 145 


“ So are we/’ Alicia told him. “ And if what 
yon think you smelled is what we think we smell, 
it is n’t a — a regular perfume. It ’s a — a — a 
something that belongs to Hynds House.” 

The library was flooded with the ruddy light 
of sunset. Every bit of color in the big room 
stood out against a golden background, and a 
great golden spear fell across the dark, brooding 
face of Freeman Hynds above the old tiled fire- 
place. In that rosy glow he seemed to look down 
at us with living eyes. 

“ Is that so? ” The secretary stopped ; and his 
head w T ent up and his nose wrinkled. For the 
“ something that belonged to Hynds House ” 
walked upon the air with invisible feet. 


CHAPTER VIII 


PEACOCKS AND IVORY 

“ £50PHY, do yon remember the night we talked 
it over, and decided to come here, and yon 
were afraid of the new soil’s effect upon yonr- 
self? ” 

“ Of course. Why? ” 

“ Oh, because.” 

“ Because why? ” 

“ Just because. — I wish to gracious you had a 
little saving vanity, Sophy Smith ! ” 

“ And what, then, is this?” I asked ironically, 
and rustled my skirts. For the Westmacotes 
were to arrive that night, in time for dinner, and 
I, standing before the mirror in my room, was 
what Alicia called “ really dressed ” for the first 
time in my life. 

“ From your point of view, this is a business 
necessity. From mine, it is applied morality. 
Why, Sophy, you ’re stunning ! Here, sit down : 
I have to loosen up that hair a bit.” 

“ Now ! ” said she, when she had critically sur- 
veyed her finished work and found it good, “ Now, 
146 


PEACOCKS AND IVORY 


14T 


Sophy Smith, you are no longer efficient and 
utilitarian ; you are effective and decorative, 
thank heaven ! ” 

Really, clothes do make a tremendous differ- 
ence, after all. Why, I — Well, I no longer 
looked root-bound. 

“ I said you ’d put out new leaves and begin to 
bloom ! ” Alicia exulted. We bowed to the Sophy 
in the glass, a small and slender person with 
quantities of fair hair, a round white chin, and 
steady blue eyes. For the rest, she had a short 
nose and the rather wide mouth of a boy. She 
was n’t what you ’d call a beautiful person, but 
she was n’t displeasing to the eye. 

“ Yale , plain Sophy Smith ! ” cried Alicia, 
“ Ave, dear Lady of Hynds House! We who 
about to live salute you ! ” 

The Westmacotes were delighted with Alicia. 
The Head had noticed her just about as much as 
a Head notices a pale file-clerk in a white shirt- 
waist and a black skirt. This radiant rose- 
maiden — “ little Dawn-rose,” old Riedriech 
called her — was new to him; and so, I fancy, 
was a Miss Smith in such a frock as I was wear- 
ing. He, as well as his wife and Miss Phelps- 
Parsons, accepted us at our face-value, with the 
background of Hynds House outlining us. 

Miss Emmeline Phelps-Parsons was a lady 
with a soul. She said she had psychic conscious- 


148 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


ness and a clear green aura, and that she had 
been an Egyptian priestess in Thebes, in the time 
of Sesostris. In proof of this she showed us a 
fine little bronze Osiris holding a whip in one 
hand and the ankh in the other. ( “ My dear, 
the moment I saw him, I knew I had once prayed 
to him ! ” ) and she always wore a scarab ring. 
She had bought both in an antique-shop just off 
Washington Street. I thought this rather a far 
cry from Thebes, myself, but The Author insisted 
that if a Theban vestal of the time of Sesostris 
had to reincarnate, she would naturally and in- 
evitably come to life a Boston one. 

The Author had n’t taken any too kindly to the 
notion of other people coming to Hynds House. 
He grumbled that he had hoped he had at last 
found a quiet haven, a place that fitted him like 
a glove ; he protested piercingly against having it 
“ cluttered up with uninteresting, gobbling, gab- 
bling, ordinary people.” 

“You came too late. You should have been 
here with Great-Aunt Sophronisba,” Alicia told 
him, tartly. “ You ’d have been ideal compan- 
ions, both of you beware-of-the-doggy, hair-trig- 
ger-tempery, all-to-your-selfish.” 

The Author gasped, and rubbed his eyes. 
Never, never, in all his pampered life, had one 
so spoken to him. 

“ Why, of all the cheek ! ” exploded The 


PEACOCKS AND IVORY 


149 


Author. “ Am I to he flouted thus by a piece of 
pink-and- whiteness just escaped from the nurs- 
ery pap-spoon? ” 

“ Out of the mouths of babes — •” insinuated 
Alicia. 

The Author grinned. And his grin is redeem- 
ing. 

“ Sweet-and near-twenty,” he explained. “ I 
am not exactly all-to-myselfish, but I demand 
plenty of elbow-room in my existence. Gen- 
erally speaking, my own society bores me less 
than the society of the mutable many. I like 
Hynds House. And I like you two women. You 
are not tiresome to the ear, wearisome to the 
mind, nor displeasing to the eye. I am even 
sensible of a distinct feeling of satisfaction in 
knowing that you are somewhere around the 
house. You belong. But I ’m hanged if I want 
to see strangers come in. I object to strangers. 
Why are strangers necessary? ” 

“ For the same reason that you were.” 

“I?” The Author’s eyebrows were almost 
lost in his hair. “ My dear, deluded child, I 
knew this house, and you, and Sophy Smith, be- 
fore you were born ! I knew you,” The Author 
declared unblushingly, “ before / was born! 
Now, am I a stranger? ” 

“ Then you ought to know why Sophy and I 
have just got to have people, the sort of people 


150 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


who are coming.’ ’ She paused. “We have n’t 
best-seller royalties piled up to the roof!” 

“ No,” said The Author, bitterly, “ but I have. 
That ’s why I am forever plagued with strangers. 
That ’s why, when I discover a place and people 
that suit me to perfection, I can’t keep ’em to 
myself ! Oh, da — drat it all, anyhow ! ” 

“ But they are n’t coming to see you. They ’re 
coming to see Hynds House,” Alicia reminded 
him soothingly. “ Besides, I don’t think they ’re 
the sort of folks that care much for authors,” she 
finished, encouragingly. 

“ They ’ll care about me ” grumbled The Au- 
thor glumly. “ But let ’em come and be hanged 
to them ! I shall take — ” 

“ Soothing syrup? ” 

“ Long walks ! ” snarled The Author. “ I shall 
work all night and be invisible all day.” 

The Westmacotes, as Alicia said, did n’t 
greatly care for authors, though they sat up and 
took polite notice of this one. (One owed that 
to one’s self-respect.) Only Miss Emmeline paid 
more than passing attention to him, though her 
interest really centered in Mr. Nicholas Jelnik, 
who was dining with us that night, as was Doctor 
Richard Geddes. 

Mr. Jelnik’s presence had the effect of light- 
ening The Author’s gloom. His eyes brightened, 
his dejection changed into alertness, and there 


PEACOCKS AND IVORY 


151 


began that subtle game of under-the-surface 
thrust and parry that seemed inevitable when the 
two met. Mr. Westmac-ote listened with quiet 
enjoyment. His dinner was to his taste, Hynds 
House more than came up to his expectations, 
Alicia was Cinderella after the fairy’s wand had 
passed over her, 7 had ceased to be a mere person 
and become a personage; and he found here such 
men as Doctor Geddes, The Author, and Nicholas 
Jelnik. The Head smiled at his wife, and was at 
peace with the world. 

Miss Emmeline had already discovered the 
Lowestoft and Spode pieces in our built-in cup- 
boards; that there were two perfect apostle jugs 
in the cabinet in the hall : that our Chelsea figures 
were lovelier than any she had heretofore seen; 
and that Hynds House, in which everything was 
genuine, had an atmosphere that appealed to her 
soul, or maybe matched her clear-green aura. 
Anyhow, the house reached out for Miss Emme- 
line as with hands and laid its spell upon her 
enduringly. 

She sat beside me, with Alicia’s pet album of 
Confederate generals on her knees. 

“ I never thought I 'd have a sentimental re- 
gard for rebels,” she confessed. “ But, oh, they 
were gallant and romantic figures, when one 
looks at their old photographs here in Hynds 
House. I am Massachusetts to the bone, but I 


152 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


don’t want to hear ‘ Marching through Georgia ’ 
while I ’m here ! ” 

Mr. Jelnik, overhearing her, laughed. “ Per- 
haps I may find for you something more in keep- 
ing with Hynds House,” he said, and sauntered 
over to the old piano. Unexpectedly it came to 
life. And he began to sing: 

It was the silent, solemn hour 
When night and morning meet, 

In glided Margaret's grimly ghost, 

And stood at William's feet. 

Her face was like an April morn 
Clad in a wintry cloud: 

And clay-cold was her lily hand, 

That held her sable shroud. 

The Author shaded his eyes with his hand, his 
gaze riveted upon the singer. Alicia leaned for- 
ward, lips parted, face like an uplifted flower, 
eyes large with wonder and delight. The Con- 
federate generals slid from Miss Emmeline’s lap 
and lay face downward, forgotten. Westma- 
cote’s faded little wife, who had no children, 
crept closer to her big husband ; and gently, un- 
obtrusively, he reached out and took her hand in 
his warm grasp. 

Why did you promise love to me 
And not that promise keep? 

Why did you swear mine eyes were bright, 

Yet leave those eyes to weep? 


PEACOCKS AND IVORY 


153 


Why did you say my face was fair, 

And yet that face forsake? 

How could you win my virgin heart, 

Yet leave that heart to break? 

I am sure there is no lovelier and more touch- 
ing ballad in all our English treasury than that 
sad, simple, and most beautiful old song. And 
he had set it to an air as simple and as perfect 
as its own words, an old-world air that suited it 
and his rich and flexible voice. 

“Why, Jelnik! ” exclaimed Doctor Geddes, in 
a voice of pure astonishment. “ I knew you 
could tinkle out a tune on a piano, but, man, I 
did n’t dream it was in you to sing like this ! ” 
And he stared at his cousin. 

“ I ? d make bold to swear that Mr. Jelnik has 
a dozen more surprises up his sleeve, if he chose 
to let us see them,” The Author said pleasantly. 

“ My father’s system of education included 
music. For which I praise him in the gates,” 
Mr. Jelnik replied casually. 

“ ‘ Tinkle out a tune on a piano ? ! ” breathed 
Alicia, and cast a look of deep disdain upon the 
blundering doctor. “ Why, I ? ve never in all my 
life heard anybody sing like that ! ” 

But I saw him through a mist, and felt my 
heart ache and burn in my breast, and wondered 
what he was doing here in my house that might 


154 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


have been his house, and how I was going to walk 
through my life after he had gone out of it. 

I had a wild desire to run outside into the dark 
night and the hushed garden, away from every- 
body and weep and weep, despairingly. Because 
a veil had been torn from my eyes this night, and 
I knew that the cruellest thing that can happen 
to a woman had happened to me. There could 
be but one thing more bitter — that he or any- 
body else in the world should know it. 

So I sat there, dumb, while everybody else said 
pleasant things to him, their voices sounding 
afar, far off. 

After a while we went into the living-room 
where our new piano is, and he played for us — 
Hungarian things, I think. Then he drifted 
into Chopin, and Alicia stood by and turned his 
music for him. 

“ Those two,” whispered Miss Emmeline, “ are 
the most idyllic figures I have ever seen.” I 
think she sighed as she said it. “ Youth is the 
most beautiful thing in the world,” she added. 

The Westmacotes, weary after a long journey, 
retired early. Mr. Jelnik and Doctor Geddes had 
gone off together. The secretary had to finish a 
chapter. The Author lingered to ask, oddly 
enough, if I had the original plan of Hynds 
House. Did I know who designed it? 

“ Why don’t you interview Judge Gatchell? ” 


PEACOCKS AND IVORY 


155 


“ I did. He was polite and friendly enough, 
but knows no more than is strictly legal. He 
told me he found Hynds House here when he ar- 
rived and expected to leave it here when he de- 
parted. And Geddes knows no more. Geddes 
is n’t interested in Hynds House by itself,” fin- 
ished The Author, with a crooked smile. 

“ Perhaps Mr. Jelnik may have some family 
papers.” 

“ Perhaps he may. I ’d give something for a 
whack at those papers, Miss Smith.” 

“ Why not ask him to let you see them, then? ” 

“ Tut, tut ! ” said The Author, crossly, and 
took himself off. 

When I was kimonoed, braided, and slippered, 
Alicia in like raiment came in from her room 
next to mine, sat down on the floor, and leaned 
her head against my knees, with her cheek 
against my hand. 

For a while, as women do, we discussed the 
events of the evening. Both of us had deep cause 
for gratification; yet both of us were strangely 
subdued. 

“ Sophy, Peacocks and Ivory is a very wonder- 
ful person, isn’t he?” hesitated Alicia, after a 
long pause. She did n’t lift her head ; and the 
cheek against my hand was warmer than usual. 

“ Yes,” I agreed, quietly, “ so wonderful that 
something never to be replaced will have gone out 


156 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


of our lives when he goes away, and does n’t come 
back any more. For that is what the Nicholas 
Jelniks do, my dear.” 

“ Is it? ” Again she spoke after a pause. “ I 
wonder ! Somehow, I — Sophy, he belongs 
here. He ’s — why, Sophy, he’s a part of the 
glamour.” 

“ I ’m afraid glamour has n’t part nor place in 
plain folks’ lives.” 

“ But we are n’t plain folks any more, either, 
Sophy,” she insisted. “ Why — why — we ’ re 
part of the glamour, too ! ” 

“ That is just about half true.” 

Alicia ignored this. She asked, instead : 

“ Did you hear what that great blundering doc- 
tor said about tinkling out a tune on a piano? ” 

I could hear Mr. Jelnik praised by her or 
doubted by The Author. But somehow I could 
not bear any criticism of Doctor Geddes just 
then. I said stiffly : 

“ I have learned to appreciate Doctor Geddes.” 

“ You are far too fair-minded not to.” Pres- 
ently: “ Sophy?” 

“ Uh-huh.” 

“ We are n’t ever going to be sorry we came 
here — together — are we, Sophy? And we 
won’t ever let anybody come between us. Not 
anybody. Not The Author — nor his secretary 
— nor whatever guests come — nor Mr. Nicholas 


PEACOCKS AND IVORY 


157 


Jelnik — nor — nor Doctor Richard Geddes.” 
Her head pressed closer to my knees. 

“ We came first, you and I,” said Alicia, in a 
muffled whisper. “ We are more to each other 
than any of them can be to us. You ’ll remember 
that, won’t you? ” 

“ I will remember, you absurd Alicia ! ” But 
I did not ask my dear girl what her incoherent 
words might mean. I did not ask why the soft 
cheek against my hand w T as wet. 

As I have said before, Hynds House is but 
two stories high, with deep cellars under it, and 
an immense attic overhead; an attic all cut up 
into nooks and corners, and twists and turns, and 
sloping roofs and dormer windows, and two or 
three shallow steps going up here, and two or 
three more going down there, and passages and 
doors where you ’d never look for them. We had 
never been able fully to explore our attic. It 
was Ali Baba’s cave to us, with half its treasures 
unguessed and every trunk and box whispering, 
“ Say ‘ Open, Sesame,’ to me, and see what you ’ll 
find!” 

While I was sitting with Alicia’s head against 
my knee, a light, swift footstep sounded overhead 
in the attic, followed by a sort of stumble, as if 
somebody had slipped on one of those unexpected 
steps. Alicia rose quickly. 

“ Sophy,” she breathed, “ I have thought, once 


158 A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 

or twice, that I heard somebody walking in the 
attic.” 

“ We will soon find out who it is, then,” said 
I. Noiselessly w T e stole out into the hall, past 
the sleeping Westmacotes, and Miss Emmeline 
Phelps-Parsons who so longed to come in closer 
contact with the occult and unknown. We 
moved like ghosts, ourselves, our felt-soled mules 
making no sound. 

The Author opened his door just as we ap- 
proached it, and held up an imperious finger. 

“ Did you hear it, too? ” he whispered. And 
walking ahead of us, he stole up the cork-screw 
stairway at the end of the side hall, lifted the 
latch of the attic door, and stepped inside. 

It was frightfully dark up there. If you 
peered through the uncurtained windows you 
could see tree-tops tossing like black waves 
against the dark sky, and in between them roll- 
ing clouds, and little bright patchwork spaces of 
stars. And it was so quiet you could hear your 
heart beat, and your breathing seemed to rattle 
in your ears. We strained our eyes, seeking to 
pierce the gloom, stealing forward step by step. 
A board creaked, noisily ; and then — I could 
have sworn it — then something seemed to move 
across one of the dormer windows. It was so 
vague, so shadowy, that one could not distin- 


PEACOCKS AND IVORY 159 

guish its outline ; one could only think that some- 
thing moved. 

The Author gave an exclamation and switched 
on his electric torch, trying to focus the circle of 
light upon that particular window. There was 
nothing there. Only, it seemed to me that some- 
thing, incredibly swift and silent, flashed down 
one of the bewildering turns to which our attic 
is addicted. But when we ran forward, the pass- 
age was empty. We brought up at the red brick 
square of one of the chimney stacks. 

Almost savagely The Author flashed his light 
over every inch of wall and floor. Nothing. But 
on the close and musty air stole, not a sound, but 
a scent. 

The Author swung around and trotted back. 
The window across which we thought we had seen 
something move was fastened from the inside, 
and there were one or two wooden boxes and a 
leather-covered trunk in the dormer recess. He 
sniffed hound-like around these, and with an 
exclamation leaned over. Behind the trunk 
crouched — Potty Black, with a mouse clamped 
in her jaws. 

“ For heaven’s sake I ” cried Alicia. “ The 
cat ! Sophy, what we heard was the cat ! ” 

“ Let us go/’ said The Author. And feeling 
rather silly, we trailed after him. 


160 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


“You see/’ said I, “ there is nothing. There 
never is anything.” 

“ Come in my room for a minute,” The Author 
whispered, and there was that in his voice which 
made us obey. 

Inside his door, he opened his hand. In his 
palm was a soiled and crumpled scrap of tough, 
parchment-like paper about the size of an ordi- 
nary playing-card, so frayed and creased that 
one had difficulty in deciphering the writing on 
it. There clung to it a faint and unforgetable 
scent. 

“ It was behind the trunk, partly under the 
cat’s black paw. I smelled it when I leaned over, 
and I thought we might as well have a look at it.” 
said The Author. 

And on the following page is what The Author 
had found. 

“ Shades of E. A. Poe, and Robert Louis the Be- 
loved! What have we here? ” cried The Author, 
joyously, and stood on one leg like a stork. 
“ Was there a Hynds woman named Helen? 
i Turn Hellen’s Key three tens and three ? 9 
Some keyhole! I say, Miss Smith, let me keep 
this for a while, will you? ” 

“ Do, Sophy, let him keep it ! ” pleaded Alicia. 

“ I ’ll take the best care of it, Miss Smith ; in- 
deed I will ! ” The Author promised. “ Look 
here : I ’ll lock it in the clothes-closet, in the 


PEACOCKS AND IVORY 


161 



breast pocket of my coat.” As he spoke, he 
opened the cedar-lined closet, that was almost 
as big as a modern hall bedroom, and put the 
paper in the breast pocket of his coat. Lock- 
ing the door, he placed the key under his pillow, 
and beside it a new and businesslike Colt 
automatic. 

“ There ! ” said The Author, confidently. “ No- 
body can get into that closet without first 


162 A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 

tackling me. Now you girls go to bed. To-mor- 
row we ’ll tackle the unraveling.” 

And we, remembering of a sudden that we were 
pig-tailed and kimonoed, and that The Author 
himself resembled a step-ladder with a shawl 
draped around it, departed hurriedly. 

He was late at the breakfast-table next morn- 
ing. Gloom and abstraction sat visibly upon 
him. He left his secretary to bear the brunt of 
conversation with the Westmacotes and Miss 
Emmeline. For once he failed to do justice to 
Mary Magdalen’s hot biscuit, and ignored Fer- 
nolia’s astonished and concerned stare; even a 
whispered, “ Honey, is you-all got a misery any- 
wheres? ” failed to rouse him. I found him, 
after a while, waiting for me in the library. 

“ Miss Smith,” — The Author strode restlessly 
up and down — “ this house has a peculiar effect 
upon people; a very peculiar effect. Since I 
came here, I have learned to walk in my sleep.” 
And seeing my look of astonishment, “ I walked 
in my sleep last night. And I took that bit of 
doggerel out of my coat pocket, locked the closet 
door, and replaced the key under my pillow.” 

“ How strange! And where did you put it? ” 
I wondered. 

“ Exactly: where did I put it?” repeated The 
Author, rumpling his hair with both hands. 
“ That ’s what I want to know, myself. I ’ve 


PEACOCKS AND IVORY 


163 


looked everywhere in my room, and in Johnson’s, 
and I can’t find the thing. It ’s gone,” and he 
stalked out, with his shoulders hunched to his 
ears. 

I sat still, staring out at the window. There 
was a thing I had n’t told The Author, or even 
Alicia. I had no idea what the “bit of dog- 
gerel ” meant, if, indeed, it meant anything. But 
when I had held Freeman Hynds’s old diary in 
my hands, between the two pages following the 
last entry had been a creased and soiled piece of 
paper. I had seen it out of the tail of my eye, 
as the saying is. It was only a glimpse, but one 
trained to handle many papers, as I had been, 
has a quick and an accurate eye. And I knew 
that the paper found by The Author in the attic, 
and now lost again, was the paper I had seen in 
Freeman Hynds’s diary. 


CHAPTER IX 


THE JUDGMENT OF SPRING 

J UDGE GATCHELL’S nephews and nieces, 
brought by that punctilious gentleman to 
call upon Miss Alicia Gaines, found her enchant- 
ing and cried it to the circumambient air. It 
was as if the voice of April had summoned the 
cohorts of Spring. For fresh-faced boys of a 
sudden appeared in increasing numbers; and 
flower-faced girls came fluttering into Hynds 
House like butterflies. They cared for its his- 
tory and its hatreds not a fig : what has April to 
do with last November? The faith of Youth has 
a clearer-eyed wisdom, a sweeter, sounder justice 
than the sourer verdict of the mature. For 
theirs is the judgment of Spring. By this sign 
they conquer. 

Susy Gatchell enlisted Mary Meade and Helen 
Fenwick, and these three held all younger Hynds- 
ville in the hollow of their pink palms. After 
which, as Doctor Richard Geddes told me wratli- 
fully, you “ could n’t put your foot down 'without 
running the risk of stepping on some little cock- 
erel trying to crow around Hynds House.” 

164 


THE JUDGMENT OF SPRING 165 


The tide was turning in our direction. Also, 
we were in daily contact with really worth-while 
people, people that otherwise we should have met 
only in books, magazines, and newspapers. And 
they liked us. The amazing miracle was that 
we, also we, were their sort of folk ! 

I knew I was being given unbuyable things. 
One could not live under the same roof with thin 
dark Luis Morenas and view what magic his pen- 
cil worked, without learning somewhat of the 
holiness of creative work. One couldn’t listen 
to The Author without being somewhat bright- 
ened by his daring wit, his glowing genius; nor 
live face to face with big Westmacote without 
revering the broadness of the American master 
spirit, to which Big Business is only a part of 
the Great Game. As for Miss Emmeline Phelps- 
Parsons, it did n’t take Alicia and me long to 
discover what real depths underlay that Boston- 
spinster mind of hers. 

And you simply could n’t breathe the same air 
with The Suffragist — who appeared with two 
trunks, three valises, and a type-writer, all cov- 
ered with “ Votes for Women ! ” stickers — with- 
out an expansion of the chest. She gave you the 
impression of having been dressed by machinery 
out of gear, and of then having been whacked flat 
with a shovel. When she clapped on what she 
called a hat, you wondered whether a heron 


166 A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 

had n’t built its nest on her head. But when she 
began to speak, you listened with the ears of your 
immortal soul stretched wide. Women wor- 
shiped her, though Mr. Jelnik’s eyes danced, and 
Westmacote’s military mustache bristled a bit, 
and she all but drove Doctor Richard Geddes, 
who had notions of his own, out of his senses. 

“ Stop trying to argue with me, my dear man,” 
she ’d say in her rich voice, “ but come and let us 
reason together. I haven’t heard one word of 
reason from you yet ! ” And she ’d let loose one 
of her rollicking laughs that set the doctor’s teeth 
on edge and made The Author shudder. The 
Author snarled to me that she laughed like a roll- 
ing-mill and reasoned like a head-on collision. 
He put her in his new book, clothes and all. 
Just as Luis Morenas, with an edged smile on his 
thin lips, made rapid-fire sketches of her. He 
called her “ The Future-Maker.” 

Now, should n’t Alicia and I have been happy? 
And yet we were n’t. Alicia’s laugh w r as n’t so 
frequent. I would catch her watching me, with 
an odd, troubled, anxious speculation in her eyes. 
She had a habit of blushing suddenly, and as 
quickly paling. And quietly, but none the less 
surely and definitely, she had begun to avoid 
Doctor Richard Geddes. It wasn’t that she 
ceased to be friendly ; but she placed between her- 
self and him one of those women-built, impalpa- 


THE JUDGMENT OF SPRING 167 


ble, impassable barriers which baffled, puzzled 
men are unable to tear down. It was impossible, 
I thought, that she should remain blind to his 
open passion for herself: he was anything but 
subtle, was Richard of the Lionheart. A blind 
man could have told, from the mere sound of his 
voice, a deaf man from the mere expression of 
his eyes, that Alicia had the big doctor’s whole 
heart. 

On his side, he was in deep waters. His ruddy 
color faded; his face took on a fixed, grim in- 
tensity. And when he watched the girl flirting 
now r with this boy, now with that, after the inno- 
cent fashion of natural girls, but always reserv- 
ing a friendlier smile, a more eager greeting, for 
Mr. Nicholas Jelnik, I was so sorry for Doctor 
Richard that I could n’t help trying, covertly, to 
console him. 

It so happened that Miss Emmeline Phelps- 
Parsons, daughter of the Puritans though she 
was, nevertheless had a distinct liking for what 
she termed Episcopacy. She was pleased with 
old St. Polycarp’s. She liked Mrs. Haile, to 
whom she happened to mention that her op- 
portunities for studying the life of native women 
and children in the East had been rather unusu- 
ally good, since she had visited many missionary 
stations in China and India. Things were 
languishing just then, and Mrs. Haile looked at 


168 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


Miss Emmeline almost imploringly: would she, 
could she, give the ladies a little lecture? — tell 
us things first-hand, so to speak? 

Miss Emmeline reflected. She looked at Alicia 
and me. 

“ Could we have it in your delightful library? ” 
she wondered. “ That beautiful old room has a 
soul which speaks to mine. Dear Miss Smith, 
would it be too much to ask you to let me have 
my little talk, a very informal little lecture, in 
wonderful old Hynds House? ” 

Mrs. Haile turned a sort of greenish pink. It 
was n’t for her to suggest, after that, that it 
might be better to have the lecture in the parson- 
age; any more than for me to hint, without un- 
graciousness, that it might be just as well not to 
have it in Hynds House. Alicia shot me one 
quizzical, Irish-blue glance when I said, “ Yes.” 

And that ’s how, on a sunny Wednesday after- 
noon, all Hyndsville came to Hynds House to 
hear Miss Emmeline Phelps-Parsons tell them 
“ How to Reach the Women of the East.” Some* 
how, I rather think they were as curious about 
two Yankee women as they w r ere about those 
Eastern women of whom Miss Emmeline was 
talking. I ’m sure Hynds House was just as in- 
teresting to them as Mohammedan harems and 
Indian zenanas. 

Miss Emmeline really spoke well, and her audi- 


THE JUDGMENT OF SPRING 169 


ence was interested in her, in her theme, and in 
Hvnds House. The Suffragist picked up the 
thread where the less gifted woman dropped it, 
and in simple, living phrases drove home the 
great truth of the sisterhood of all women. 

Which, of course, called for tea, and some of 
Mary Magdalen’s cookies. It was the cookies 
that caught The Author. Coming in from a long 
and hungry prowl, he spied Fernolia crossing the 
hall with a huge platter, got one tantalizing, 
mouth-watering odor, and dashed after her, bent 
upon robbery. A second later he found himself 
in a room full of women. Hyndsville was meet- 
ing The Author! 

Alicia introduced him, pleasantly. And, 
“ Talk about angels — ” said she, gaily, “ We 
have just this minute stopped talking about the 
heathen ! And may I give you a cup of tea? ” 

“And a dozen or so cookies, please. Thank 
heaven for the heathen ! What is home without 
the heathen? — Without sugar, Miss Gaines, 
without sugar ! And for charity’s sake, no 
lemon ! ” 

He sipped his tea and munched his cookies, 
with his head on one side and the air of a thiev- 
ish jackdaw; and proceeded, after his wont, to 
extract such pith as the situation offered. 

“ Doctor Johnson,” Miss Martha Hopkins re- 
membered, as she watched him drinking his 


170 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


fourth cup of tea, “ Doctor Johnson was also 
addicted to tea-drinking. Most great literary 
men are, I believe.” 

“ It is n’t possible you consider old Johnson a 
great literary man ! ” The Author ’s eyebrows 
climbed into his hair. 

“ Why ! was n’t he? ” Her eyes widened. She 
had as much respect for Dr. Johnson as Miss De- 
borah Jenkyns had, though of course she never 
read him. Life is too short, 

“Why! was he?” asked The Author. “Out- 
side of Boswell — and he was a fool — I ’ve never 
known anybody who thought he amounted to 
much.” 

The Suffragist looked up. “ Nelson had his 
Southey, Boswell had his Johnson, and Mr. Mod- 
ern Best-seller may well profit by their example.” 
And she smiled grimly. 

The Author’s lip lifted. “ Oh, but you 
could n’t do it ! ” he purred. “ And if I offered 
you the job you ’d excuse your incapacity on the 
ground that there wasn’t anything to write 
about. I know you ! ” He took another cooky. 

“ Yes, I dare say I ’d blurt out the truth. 
Women are like that,” admitted The Suffragist. 

“ The female of the species is more deadly than 
the male,” conceded The Author. “ Neverthe- 
less,” he raised his tea-cup gallantly, “ To the 
ladies ! ” He got up, leisurely. “ And now I 


THE JUDGMENT OF SPRING 171 

go/’ said he, “ to paint the lily and adorn the 
rose. In short, to set forth in adequate and re- 
munerative language the wit, wisdom, virtue, 
beauty, and ornateness of woman as she thinks 
men think she is. Nature,” reflected The Au- 
thor, smiling at The Suffragist, “ made me a 
writer. The devil, the editors, and the women 
have made me a best-seller.” And he departed, 
a cooky in each hand. 

That night one of the Gatchell boys took Alicia 
to a dance. She was in blue and white, like an 
angel, and the Gatchell boy trod on air. But to 
me came Doctor Richard Geddes, and threw him- 
self into a wing-chair. 

“ Sophronisba Two,” he asked, we being alone 
in the library, “w T hat have I done to offend 
Alicia? ” 

“ Is Alicia offended?” 

“ Is n’t she? ” wondered the doctor. “ She 
won’t let me get near enough to find out,” he 
added gloomily. “ And it is n’t just. She ought 
to know that — well, that I ’d rather cut off my 
right hand than give her real cause for offense. 

I ’m going to ask you a straight, man question ; 
is that girl a — a flirt? She is not a — jilt? ” 

“ Heaven forbid ! ” 

“ Does she care for anybody else? ” 

“ On my honor, I don’t know.” 

“ It could n’t be any of these whipper-snappers 


172 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


of boys : she ’s not that sort,” worried the doctor. 
“ Sophy, is it — Jelnik? ” 

My heart stood still. I could make no reply. 

“ I don’t know. My dear friend, I don’t 
know ! ” 

“ It would be the most natural thing in the 
world,” he reflected. “Jelnik looks like Prince 
Charming himself. And, for all his surface in- 
dolence, there ’s genius in the man. Why 
shouldn’t she be taken with him?” 

We looked at each other. 

“ I see,” said the doctor, quietly. “ Now, lit- 
tle friend, what concerns you and me is our dear 
girl's happiness. Does Jelnik care, do you 
think? ” 

“ I don’t know ! ” I said again. I felt like one 
on the rack. It seemed to me I could hear my 
heart-strings stretching and snapping. “ But 
what is one girl’s affection to a man born to 
be loved by women? ” 

“ He is indifferent to women, for the most 
part,” the doctor said thoughtfully. “ He is so 
free from vanity, and at the same time so re- 
served, that one has difficulty in getting at his 
real feelings.” 

“ She, also, is free from petty vanity,” I told 
him. “ She has an innocent, happy pleasure in 
her own youth and prettiness, but hers is the un- 
spoiled heart of a child.” 


THE JUDGMENT OF SPRING 173 


“ Who should know it better than I, that am a 
great hulking, bad-tempered fellow twice her 
age ! ” groaned the doctor. “ Yet, Sophy, I could 
make her happier than Jelnik could. Dear and 
lovely as she is, she could n’t make him happy, 
either — Don’t you think I ’m a fool, Sophy? ” 

“ No,” said I, smiling w T anly ; “ I don’t.” 

“ This business of being in love is a damnable 
arrangement. Here was I,” he grumbled, “ busy, 
reasonably happy, with a sound mind in a sound 
body, and a digestion that was a credit to me. 
And along comes a girl, and everything ’s 
changed! My work doesn’t fill my days, my 
food is bitter in my mouth, and I wake up in the 
night saying to myself, ‘ You fool, you ’re chasing 
rainbows!’ Sophy, don’t you ever fall in love 
with somebody you know you can’t have ! It ’s 
hell ! ” 

I did n’t tell him I knew it. 

One of his men came to tell him he was needed 
urgently. As it meant a thirty-mile trip and 
the night was cold, I made him wait for a cup 
of coffee and an omelet.” 

“ Miss Smith — ” 

“You said ‘ Sophy’ a while ago. ‘ Sophy’ 
sounds all right to me.” 

“ It sounds fine to me, too, Sophy.” And he 
reached out and seized my hand with a grip that 
made me wince. 


174 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


“I told you I was a bear!” he said, regret- 
fully. 

When Alicia returned, she came, as usual, to 
my room. 

“ I am tired ! ” she yawned, and curled her- 
self up on the bed. 

“ Did n’t you have a nice time? ” 

“ Oh, I suppose so ! Everybody was lovely to 
me, and I could have divided my dances. These 
Southerners are easy to love, are n’t they? I find 
it very easy for me ! And oh, Sophy, there ’s to 
be a picnic day after to-morrow, at the Meade 
plantation, in my honor, if you please! We go 
by automobile. — I never thought I could get 
tired dancing, Sophy. But I am. Tired ! ” 

“ Go to bed and sleep it off.” 

“ Did you have time to make out that grocery 
list? They ’ve been overcharging us on butter.” 

“ Yes : I finished it after Doctor Geddes left.” 

“Oh! He was here, then?” She yawned 
again. 

“Yes. But somebody sent for him, and he 
had to cut his visit short.” 

Alicia frowned. 

“ I wonder he keeps so healthy, running out 
at all hours of the night ; and heaven knows how 
he manages about meals ! His cook told me that 
sometimes he has to rush away in the middle of a 
meal, and sometimes he misses one altogether.” 


THE JUDGMENT OF SPKING 175 

“ I remembered that, so I made him wait for 
a cup of coffee and an omelet.” 

She reached over and squeezed my hand. 
“ You ’re always thinking about other people's 
comfort, Sophy.” She paused, and looked at me 
half-questioningly : 

“ I wish he had somebody to look after him,” 
she said in a low voice, “ somebody like you.” 
She added, as if to herself: “ He takes two 
lumps of sugar in his coffee, one in his tea, wants 
dry toast, and likes his omelet buttered” 

And when I stared at her, she slipped nearer, 
and laid her cheek against mine. 

“ Sophy,” in a soft whisper, “ you ’ve made up 
to me for my father and my mother, and for the 
sisters and brothers I never had. We ’re all 
sorts and conditions of folks, are n’t we, Sophy? 
— but none like you, Sophy ; not any one of them 
all like you ! ” 

At that moment, through the open window, 
there stole in on the night air the faintest whis- 
per of music. It was n’t mournful, it was n’t 
joyful, but both together; a singing voice, a cry- 
ing voice, wild and sweet, part of the night and 
the trees and the wind, and part, I think, of the 
secretest something in the human heart. We 
had no idea where it came from ; out of the sky, 
perhaps ! 

Somebody ran down-stairs, and a moment later 


176 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


the front door opened softly. The Author had 
heard, and was afoot. But even as he stepped 
outside, Ariel’s ghostly music ceased. There 
was nothing; nobody; only the night. 


CHAPTER X 


THE FOREST OF ARDEN 

1 HAD seen Alicia whirl away in the Meades’ 
big car. I had seen the Westmacotes and 
Miss Emmeline off on what they termed a nature- 
hunt. The Author and his secretary were up 
to the eyes in a new chapter; The Suffragist 
was spreading the glad tidings; and Riedriech 
and Schmetz had Luis Morenas in hand for the 
afternoon, visioning the United States of the 
World, while he snatched sketches of the vision- 
aries. 

The Author, Mr. Johnson, and I, lunched to- 
gether. 

“Miss Smith,” began The Author abruptly, 
“ did you know this house was built by British 
and French master masons? No? Well, it was. 
Judge Gatchell’s father, grandfather, and great- 
grandfather were solicitors for this estate, and 
the judge at last very kindly allowed me to 
look through a great batch of papers in his pos- 
session. From these I discovered that one of the 
Hyndses visited England in 1727, joined the new 
lodge lately established there, and brought one 
177 


178 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


of the brethren, an architect, back to America 
with him. Another came from France. These 
three planned and built this house, and did it 
pretty well, too. 

“ This house-builder, Walsingham Hynds, 
made his house a sort of lodge for the brethren, 
just as in later times his grandsons sheltered 
the brethren of those societies that fathered the 
American Revolution. Gatchell tells me there 
is a legend of the master of Hynds House en- 
tertaining British officers and at the same time 
hiding the forfeited rebels they were hunting. 
I ? d like to know,” The Author added, reflectively, 
“ where he hid them.” 

“ An old house like this has dozens of places 
where one could be hidden without much danger 
of detection,” remarked Mr. Johnson. 

“ I ’m pretty sure of that,” agreed The Author, 
emphatically. 

“You should be, since you did a neat little 
bit of hiding on your own account,” Mr. John- 
son reminded him. 

The Author was nettled. He had never found 
the paper lost out of the closet in his own room, 
though he had never given up a tentative search 
for it. 

“ Well, it ’s confoundedly odd I never did such 
a thing before,” he grumbled. 

“ What is odd is that I myself was waked out 


THE FOREST OF ARDEN 


179 


of my sleep that night by the most oppressive 
sense of misery and hopelessness I have ever ex- 
perienced, Mr. Johnson said seriously. “It 
was so overpowering that it made me think of 
Saint Theresa’s description of her torment in 
that oven in the wall of hell which had by kindly 
forethought on the part of the devil been ar- 
ranged for her permanent tenancy. Of course, 
it was just a nightmare,” he added, doubtfully; 
“ or perhaps a fit of indigestion.” 

“ Indigestion takes many forms,” I remarked, 
as lightly as I could. “ And you must remember 
you ’ve been warned that Hynds House is 
haunted. Why, the servants insist they ’ve seen 
ol’ Mis’ Scarlett’s h’ant ! ” 

“ Ah ! ” nodded The Author. “ And I smell a 
msyterious perfume, I walk in my sleep for the 
first and only time in my life, and I hide where 
it can’t be found a paper with an uncouth jingle 
and some dots on it. Johnson and I have the 
same nightmare. And I have heard footsteps. 
All hallucinations, of course! I will say this 
much for Hynds House : I never had a hallucina- 
tion until I came here. By the way, did I merely 
imagine I heard a violin last night? ” 

“Oh, no: I heard it, too.” Mr. Johnson 
looked at The Author with a concerned face. 
“ You ’re getting a bit off your nerves, Chief. 
Anybody might play a violin.” 


180 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


“ Anybody might, but few do play it as I 
thought I heard it played last night. Who ’s the 
player, Miss Smith ? ” 

“ I have n’t the slightest idea. Alicia thinks 
it ’s a spirit that lives in the crape-myrtle trees.” 

I was beginning to be aweary of The Author’s 
shrewd eyes and persistent questioning, and I 
was heartily glad when he had to go back to his 
work. 

That was a gray and windless afternoon, and 
the house was full of those bluish shadows that 
belong to gray days; it was charged, even more 
than usual, with mystery : the whole atmosphere 
tingled with it as with electricity. I could n’t 
read. I have never been able to play upon any 
musical instrument, much as I love music. I do 
not sing, either, except in a small-beer voice ; and 
when I tried to sew I pricked my fingers with the 
needle. I went into the kitchen, consulted with 
Mary Magdalen as to the evening’s dinner, 
weighed and measured such ingredients as she 
needed, saw that the two maids were following 
instructions, tried to make friends with Beautiful 
Dog, until he howled with anguish and affliction 
and fled as from pestilence; and, unable to en- 
dure the house any longer, put on my hat and set 
out upon one of those aimless walks one takes in 
a land where all walks are lovely. 

Automobiles came and went upon the public 


THE FOREST OF ARDEN 


181 


road, and to escape them I crossed a wooden foot- 
bridge spanning a weedy ditch, struck into a 
path bordering a wide field followed it aimlessly 
for a while, and before I knew it was in the 
Enchanted Wood. 

The Enchanted Wood was carpeted with 
brown and sweet-smelling pine-needles, with 
green clumps of honeysuckle breaking out here 
and there in moist spots. There were cassena 
bushes, full of vivid scarlet berries ; and crooked, 
gray-green cedars ; and brown boles of pine-trees ; 
and the shallowest, gayest, absurdest little 
thread of a brook giggling as it went about its 
important business of keeping a lip of wood- 
land green. 

It was very, very still there, somewhat as 
Gethsemane might have been, I fancy. I had 
wanted to be alone, that I might wrestle with my 
trouble. Yet now that I was facing it, my spirit 
quailed. Never had I felt so desolate, or 
dreamed that the human heart could bear such 
anguish. 

If I had had the faintest warning, that I might 
have saved myself! If I had never come to 
Hynds House at all, but had lived my busy, 
matter-of-fact, quiet life! Yet the idea of never 
having seen him, never having loved him, was 
more cruel than the cruellest suffering that lov- 
ing entailed. It was harder even than the 


182 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


thought that Alicia and I cared for the same 
man, who perhaps cared for neither of us. At 
that I fell into an agony of weeping. 

That passed. I was spent and empty. But 
the calm of acceptance had come. I was n’t to 
lose my grip, nor wear the willow. The idea 
of me, Sophy Smith, wearing the willow, aroused 
my English common-sense. I refused to he 
ridiculous. 

And then I looked up and saw him coming 
toward me, his great dog trotting at his side. 
I pulled myself together, and smiled; for Boris 
was thrusting his friendly nose into my palm, 
and rubbing his fine head against my shoulder, 
and his master had dropped lightly down beside 
me. 

I had not seen Mr. Jelnik for several days, 
and it struck me painfully that the man was 
pale, that his step dragged, and the brightness 
of his beauty was dimmed. He looked older, 
more careworn. If he was glad to see me, it 
was at first a troubled gladness, for he started, 
and bit his lip. I wondered, not with jealousy, 
but with pain, if there was somebody, some beau- 
tiful and high-born lady, at sight of whom his 
heart might have leaped as mine did now. Was 
it, perhaps, to forget such a one that he had 
exiled himself? 

“ You are such a serene, restful little person ! ” 


THE FOREST OF ARDEN 


183 


he said presently, and a change came over his 
tired face; “ and I am such a restless one! You 
soothe me like a cool hand on a hot forehead.” 

“Restless? — you? Why, I thought you the 
serenest person I had ever known.” 

His mocking, gentle smile curved his lips. 
But his eyes were not laughing. For a fleeting, 
flashing second the whirlpools and the depths 
were bared in them. Then the veil fell, the 
surface lights came out and danced. 

“ My father was an excellent teacher,” he said, 
indifferently. “ The whole object of his train- 
ing was self-control. He was really a very won- 
derful man, my father. But he overlooked one 
highly important factor in my make-up, my 
Hynds blood.” 

I made no reply. I was wondering, perplex- 
edly, how I, I of all people, should have been 
picked up and enmeshed in the web of these 
Hyndses and their fate. 

“ Thank you/’ said he, gratefully, “ for your 
silence. Most women would have talked, for the 
good of my soul. Why don’t you talk? ” 

“ Because I have nothing to say.” 

“You evidently inherited a God-sent reticence 
from your British forebears. The British have 
‘ illuminating flashes of silence.’ It is one of 
their saving graces.” 

I proved it. 


184 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


Mr. Jelnik, with a whimsical, sidewise glance, 
drew nearer. 

“ Why, instead of sitting at the foot of a pine- 
tree, which is also a reticent creature, are you 
not sitting at the feet of our friend The Author, 
who is perfectly willing to illumine the universe? 
Very bright man, The Author. How do you like 
his secretary? ” 

“Mr. Johnson? Oh, very much indeed! He 
is charming ! ” 

“ I find him so myself. But he is melting 
wax before the fire of feminine eyes. A man in 
love is a sorry spectacle ! ” 

“ Is he? ” 

“ Ach, yes ! Consider my cousin Richard 
Geddes, for instance.” 

At that I winced, remembering the doctor’s 
eyes when he had spoken of Alicia and of this 
man. I looked at Mr. Jelnik now, wonderingly. 
If he knew that much, hadn’t he any heart? 
He stopped short. A wrinkle came between his 
black brows. 

“ I am not to speak lightly of my Cousin Rich- 
ard, I perceive.” 

“ No. Please, please, no ! ” 

“ I had n’t meant to. Richard,” said Mr. Jel- 
nik, gravely, “is a good man.” 

“ Oh, yes! Indeed, yes! And-— and he has 
a deep affection for you , Mr. Jelnik.” 


THE FOREST OF ARDEN 


185 


“ We Hyndses are the deuce and all for affec- 
tion. We take it in such deadly earnest that 
we store up a fine lot of trouble for ourselves.” 
His face darkened. 

I had been right, then, in supposing that there 
was somebody, perhaps half the world away, for 
whom he cared. And he did n't care for Alicia. 
I was sure of that. 

“ Don’t go ! ” he begged, as I stirred. “ Stay 
with me for a little while: I need you. I am 
tired, I am bored, I am disgusted with things 
as they are. There is nothing new under the 
sun, and all is vanity and vexation of spirit. 
Also, I am fronting the forks of a dilemma : 
Shall I shake the dust of Hyndsville from my 
foot, yield to the Wanderlust and go what our 
worthy friend Judge Gatchell calls ‘ tramping,’ 
or shall I stay here yet awhile? I can’t make 
up my mind ! ” 

“ Do you want to go? ” 

“ Yes and no. Hold : let ’s toss for it and let 
the fall of the coin decide.” He took from his 
pocket a thin silver foreign coin, and showed 
it me. 

“ Heads, I go. Tails, I stay,” he said, and 
tossed it into the air. It fell beside me, out 
of his reach. With a swift hand I picked it 
up. 

“ Well? ” he asked, indifferently. 


186 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


My hand shut down upon it. There was the 
sound of wind in my ears, and my heart pounded, 
and my sight blurred. Then somebody — oh, 
surely not I ! — in a low, clear, modulated voice 
spoke : 

“ You will have to stay, Mr. Jelnik,” said the 
voice, pleasantly. “It is tails.” 

And all the while the inside Me, the real Me, 
was crying accusingly: “ Oh, liar! liar! It is 
heads ! ” 

Did he smile? I do not know. He did not 
look at me for the minute, but stared instead at 
the gray-blue, shadowed woods, the brown boles 
of the pines, the bright trickle of water playing 
it was a real brook. 

“ Tails it is. I stay,” he said presently. And 
with a swift movement he reached out and lightly 
patted my hand with the coin in it. 

“ Well, it ’s decided. You have got me for 
a next-door neighbor for a while longer, Miss 
Smith. No, don’t go yet.” 

So I stayed, who would have stayed in the 
Pit to be near him, or walked out of heaven to 
follow him, had he called me. 

“ Do you know,” he spoke in a plaintive voice 
— “that I haven't had any lunch? I forgot to 
go home for lunch ! Boris, go get me something 
to eat, old chap ! ” 

Boris hung out a tongue like a flag, looked 


THE FOREST OF ARDEN 


187 


in liis man’s eyes, and vanished, running as 
only the thoroughbred wolf-hound can run. 

“ I am so tired! Should you mind if I kept 
my dog’s place warm at your feet, Miss Smith? ” 
And he stretched his long length on the pine- 
needles, his hands under his head, his face up- 
turned. 

“ I wish I had a pillow ! ” he complained. 

I scooped up an armful of the pine-needles, 
while he watched me lazily, and packed it over 
and between the roots of the pine-tree. 

“ You ’re a Sister of Charity,” said he, grate- 
fully. “ But I can’t afford to scratch my neck.’’ 
And coolly he took a fold of my brown silk skirt, 
patted it over the straw, and with a sigh of sat- 
isfaction rested his head upon it. 

“ This is very pleasant ! ” he sighed. Pres- 
ently : “ Your hair looks just as a woman’s hair 

ought to look, under that brown hat,” he said 
drowsily, “ soft and fair. And after this, I shall 
order some brown-silk cushion-covers. I never 
knew anything could feel so comfortable and 
restful ! ” He closed his eyes. 

I sat there, hands locked tightly together, 
and looked down at his beautiful head, his slim 
and boyish body; and I felt an aching sense of 
resentment. No man has any business to be 
like that, and then come into the life of a woman 
named Smith. 


188 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


He did not move, nor did I. We might have 
been creatures motionless under a spell, in that 
Enchanted Wood; until from the outside world 
came Boris, carrying a wicker basket, in which 
sandwiches, fruit, a small bottle of wine, and a 
silver drinking-cup had been carefully packed. 

“ Boris is used to playing courier.” His mas- 
ter patted him affectionately. “ Come, Miss 
Smith. By the way, that is n ? t your real name, 
though. Your name is Woman-in-the- Woods. 
Mine is — ” 

“ Fortunatus.” 

He raised his brows. “ I was about to say 
‘ Man-who-is-Hungry,’ ” he finished, pleasantly. 
“ I once knew an Indian named Tail-feathers-go- 
ing-over-the-Hill. It taught me the value of be- 
ing explicit as to one’s name. Here, you shall 
have the cup, and I ’ll drink out of the bottle. 
Some of these fine days, Woman-in-the-Woods, I 
shall take you on a jaunt with me and Boris.” 

“ It sounds promising,” I admitted, cautiously., 

“ It is more. You shall learn all the fine 
points of out-of-door housekeeping. — Drink 
your wine, Woman-in-the-Woods. You were 
pale, very pale, when I came upon you. I was 
afraid something had been troubling you.” 

“ Something troubles everybody.” 

“ Oh, bromidic Miss Smith ! — Drink your 
wine, please. And do not look doubtfully upon 


THE FOREST OF ARDEN 189 

that sandwich. My man knows how to build 
them.” 

His man did. The sandwich was manna. 
The wine evidently came from heaven. 

“ Now you have a color. I say, is Morenas 
going to do you, too? ” 

“ Good gracious, no ! But he has sketched 
Alicia a dozen times at least.” 

“ And me,” said Mr. Jelnik, gloomily. 
“ There ’s no evading the brute. I turn like a 
weathercock; and there he is, with corrugated 
brow and slitted eyes, studying me! And the 
baleful eye of The Author also pursues me. Be- 
tween them, I feel skinned.” 

“ Mr. Morenas says you are a rare but quite 
perfect type,” I told him, mischievously. 

The young man shrugged his shoulders disdain- 
fully. “ Am I a type, Woman-in-the-Woods? ” he 
asked. 

“ Indeed, you are absolutely different from 
anybody else.” And then, terrified, I turned 
red. 

“ Oh, I know ! You did n’t mean it either as a 
brick-bat or a bouquet, merely the truth as you 
see it. You are transparently truthful, funda- 
mentally truthful, and at the same time the 
American business woman! You can’t under- 
stand how that intrigues me ! ” 

And then, quite simply and boyishly, he began 


190 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


to talk about himself. I got glimpses of a boy- 
hood spent partly in a stately home in Vienna, 
and partly roaming about the great Hungarian 
estate which his mother loved, and to which the 
two returned summer after summer, until her 
death. Then student days, and after that, foot- 
loose wanderings up and down the earth and 
across the seven seas. 

His grandmother had dropped courtesies to 
kings ; and mine had dropped “ aitches.” His 
father had been a European celebrity, mine a 
ship-chandler in Boston, U. S. A. Yet here we 
two were ; and he might have been a high-spirited 
and most beautiful little boy picnicking with a 
sedate and old-maidish little girl. 

“ How old should you imagine me? ” he flung 
the question like a challenge, as if he had divined 
my thoughts. 

“ Oh, say, thirteen, going on fourteen.” 

“ Dear Woman-in-the- Woods, I am thirty- 
three.” 

“ You are older than I thought.” 

“ You are younger than you think. And you 
betray the fact,” he smiled. 

“ I have never been very young ; probably I 
shall never be very old.” 

“You will always be exactly the right age,” 
said Nicholas Jelnik. “ For you will always be 
a little girl, and a young maiden, and a grown 


THE FOREST OF ARDEN 


191 


woman, and a bit of an old maid, and something 
of a grandmother. That is a wonderful, a very, 
very wonderful combination ! ” 

I looked at him with more than doubt. But 
no,, he was not poking fun, though the rich color 
had come into his cheek, and the golden lights 
flickered mischievously in his eyes. 

“ And I forgot to add, also a business woman ! ” 
he finished gaily. “Herr Gott, but it took a 
business woman to tackle old Hynds House and 
gather together such folks as you have there 
now ! ” 

“ Alicia was the head and front of that. I 
merely helped.” 

“ Alicia,” said Mr. Jelnik, “ is a darling girl. 
Alicia is everything a girl ought to be.” But 
there was not in eyes or voice that light and tone 
that crept into Doctor Richard’s when he named 
her. My dear girl’s tender face — so true and 
beautiful and loving — rose before me, and all 
she had meant to me, been to me, crowded upon 
my heart. I said what I had never intended to 
say to any one: 

“ Why, Alicia ’s my — my child , to me ! Don’t 
you understand?” 

“ Dear Woman, yes ! ” His voice was melted 
gold. 

The ridiculous little brook went whish-whis- 
sssh; and the bluish shadows melted into gray; 


192 A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


and a chill came creeping, creeping, into the air. 

“ Before you go,” said Nicholas Jelnik, “ I 
should like to give you a talisman, to turn Miss 
Smith into Woman-in-the- Woods every now and 
then.” And with his pocket-knife he cut a sharp 
line down the thin old coin he had tossed, worked 
at it for a few T minutes with a pocket file and a 
stone, and then with his fingers that looked so 
slim but were strong as steel nippers. The coin 
broke in halves. 

“ Half for you,” said Mr. Jelnik, “ and half for 
me, to commemorate a comradely afternoon, and 
to mark a decision. We ’ll consider it a token, a 
charm, a talisman — what you w r ill. And if ever 
I really and truly need a Woman-in-the- Woods to 
help me, why, I ’ll send my half to her ; and she ’ll 
obey the summons instantly and without ques- 
tion. And if ever she needs a man — like me, 
say — why, she ’ll send her half, and he ’ll come, 
instantly and without question.” He w r as smil- 
ing as he spoke. Now he paused to look at me 
. earnestly. “ Because we are going to be real 
friends, you and I; are we not? ” 

I hesitated. How could we two be real friends, 
when the balance between us was so uneven, so 
unequal? He saw the hesitation, momentary as 
it was, and looked at me with something of as- 
tonishment and a hint of hurt. 

“ I have never,” he said, proudly, “ had to ask 


THE FOREST OF ARDEN 


193 


for friendship. Yet I do desire yours, who are 
such a grave, brave, true little thing, such a val- 
iant-for-truth, stand-fast little thing! You have 
the one quality that I, born wanderer, foot-loose 
rolling-stone, need most in this world, unchang- 
ing, loyal, unquestioning steadfastness.” 

I considered this. It is true that I hold fast, 
for that is the English way. 

“ But outside of that one thing,” I told him, “ I 
have nothing else.” 

“No? — She hasn’t,” said he, in a teasing 
tone, “ anything to give, except unbuyable truth. 
She has nothing to offer except Friendship’s very 
self ! — this poor, poor Miss Smith ! ” 

Now, heaven alone knows why, but at that my 
eyes filled with foolish tears. If he saw them — 
and they ran down my cheek in spite of me — he 
mercifully gave no sign. Instead he held out his 
fine brown hand, and when I placed mine in it, 
he lifted it to his lips with foreign grace. 

“ We two are friends, then — through thick 
and thin, above doubting, and without fear or re- 
proach. That is so, heinf ” 

“ Yes ! ” I promised. 

So, walking slowly, as if loath to go, we two 
went out of the Enchanted Wood and left the 
Forest of Arden behind us. 

When I was again in my own room, and had 
taken off the brown frock, I held against my 


194 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


cheek, for a long, long minute, that fold against 
which his head had rested ; I fingered the broken 
coin; I looked long and long at the hand his lips 
had touched ; and though I had told a shameless 
lie, I was not at all ashamed. 

I have often read that women do not and can- 
not love men, but only love to be loved by them. 
Only a man could have been stupid enough to say 
that ; and, then he did n’t know. The woman 
had n’t told him. 

“ I say ! Have n't you got on a new frock to- 
night? My word, it’s scrumptious!” remarked 
The Author, after dinner. I was wearing a 
blaek-and-blue frock, and he had seen it before, 
as I explained with some surprise. 

He adjusted his glasses, frowned, and shook 
his head. 

“ I am becoming unobservant,” he said crossly. 
“ This place is playing the very deuce with my 
mental processes ! But stay : surely your hair is 
arranged differently? It wasn’t brought over 
your ears like that, the first time I saw you, I 
know it was n’t! ” 

“ It is curled a little and fluffed a little ; that ’s 
what makes it look different,” I told him pa- 
tiently. 

“ Then that frock is curled a little and fluffed 
a little, and that ’s what makes it look different, 
too,” The Author decided, and stared at me criti- 


THE FOREST OF ARDEN 195 

cally. “You are improving,” he told me, with 
condescension. 

“ You are not! ” I was goaded to reply. 

The Author merely grinned. 

“ Do you know,” he asked, “ if that man Jelnik 
is coming to-night? I hope so. Unusual man. 
Can’t think why he buries himself here! Our 
old friend Gatchell does n’t seem to admire him. 
I wonder why? ” 

“ I can’t possibly imagine,” I replied equably, 
“ unless it is that the judge grows old.” 

“ Hah ! ” The Author’s eyebrows went up 
truculently. “ And is it a sign of advancing age 
and mental decrepitude not to admire this fel- 
low? ” 

But I laughed at him. 

“ You ’re all alike, you women.” A wicked 
light snapped into his eyes. “ Hear, dear lady, 
the Bard of the Congaree, the Poet Laureate of 
South Carolina, Coogle for your benefit,” hissed 
The Author, and repeated, balefully : 

Alas, poor woman, with eyes of sparkling fire, 

Thy heart is often won by mankind’s gay attire! 

So weak thou art, so very weak at best, 

Thou canst not look -beyond a satin-lined vest! 

I Ve seen thee ofttimes cast a winning glance, 

And be carried away, as it were within a trance, 

By the gay apparel of some dishonest youth 
Whose bosom heaved with not a single truth ! 


196 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


He was so outrageously funny that I forgave 
his impertinence. His face relaxed, and his eyes 
twinkled. He was in high feather the remainder 
of the evening. He w T as, in fact, so good-humor- 
edly witty that the boys and girls Alicia had 
brought home clustered about him like golden 
bees. 

“ Miss Smith,” whispered Miss Emmeline, un- 
der cover of their laughter, “ may I have a word 
with you? ” 

We drifted into the library; and she seated her- 
self, folded her hands, and said tremulously : 

“ My dear, my wish has been granted. I have 
really come in contact with the Unknown! I 
have seen something, Miss Smith ! ” I looked at 
her steadily. “ Just before dawn,” Miss Em- 
meline continued, “ I woke up, with a curious, in- 
definable, uneasy sense of trouble, as if something 
had happened and I was remembering it, say. I 
saw how foolish it was to allow a mere night- 
mare to worry me, though I am not subject to 
nightmares, my conscience and my digestion be- 
ing quite all right, thank heaven! Gradually 
the impression faded. I was just dropping to 
sleep again, when I heard the faintest imaginable 
footfall, almost as if somebody were walking 
upon the air itself. And then, Miss Smith, there 
stole across my room a figure. There was noth- 
ing terrifying about it: it was merely a figure, 


THE FOREST OF ARDEN 


197 


that was all, and so I was not frightened. It 
came from my clothes-closet, went into the next 
room, and vanished. For when I arose and 
followed, there was no trace of it. And the doors 
were locked. Now, was not that remarkable? ” 

“ Very,” said I, with dry lips. 

“ I should have thought I was dreaming,” went 
on Miss Emmeline, “ save that there lingered in 
the air, for some time, a faint and very deli- 
cate — ■” 

“ Perfume/’ I finished. 

Miss Emmeline started, and seized my hand. 

“ Then you have experienced it, too? ” 

“ I have detected the perfume,” I admitted, 
“ but I have never seen anything. Dear Miss 
Emmeline, would it be too much to ask you to 
keep this to yourself, for a while at least? Peo- 
ple are so easily frightened; and wild stories 
spread and grow.” 

Miss Emmeline nodded. “ Of course I ’ll keep 
it quiet,” she promised kindly. “ I shall, how- 
ever, write down the occurrence for the Society 
for Psychical Research, without giving actual 
names and place.” To this I raised no objection. 
But it was with a troubled mind that I left Miss 
Emmeline. 

I was destined to hear one more confidence 
that night, unwittingly this time. I had gone 
down-stairs to place, ready to Mary Magdalen’s 


198 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


hand in the morning, the materials for the break- 
fast. This entails work, but it insures success- 
ful handling of household economics. Having 
weighed and measured what was necessary, and 
seen that the inquisitive Black family occupied 
their proper quarters on the lower veranda, I 
went back up-stairs. The Author’s door was 
slightly ajar, and I could hear him walking up 
and down, as he does when he dictates; for he 
is a restless man. 

“ Johnson,” The Author was saying as I 
passed, my slippered feet making no sound, 
“ Johnson, that Sophy woman intrigues me. 
Hanged if she doesn’t, Johnson!” 

“ I like Miss Smith, myself. She reminds me 
very much of my mother,” said Johnson’s cordial 
voice in reply. 

“ But I don’t like the way things look here, at 
all, Johnson!” fumed The Author. “ What’s 
his game, anyhow? What’s he after? What’s 
he here for? Does she know, or suspect? Or 
doesn’t she, Johnson?” The Author asked, ear- 
nestly. “ Look here : somebody ’s got to protect 
that Sophy woman against Nicholas Jelnik!” 


CHAPTER XI 


THE JINNEE INTERVENES 

J UST before he went back North, Luis Mor- 
enas good-naturedly agreed to exhibit his 
new sketches for the delectation of such folk as 
we cared to ask to view them — this to please 
Alicia, whom he called Flower o’ the Peach. 

Now an exhibit of Morenas sketches would 
have been an art event in the Biggest City itself. 
But think of it in Hyndsville, where few worth- 
while things ever happened; and imagine the 
polite wire-pulling for invitations that ensued ! 

It was n’t my fault that I could n’t ask the 
whole town to come to my house to see those bril- 
liant sketches. I would have done so with all 
my heart, but there was a section of Hyndsville 
I could n’t reach. It was locked up behind bars 
of pride and prejudice of its own building; and 
losing by it, of course, since one can’t be exclu- 
sive without at the same time being excluded. 
To shut other folks out you have first got to shut 
yourself in. 

For instance, figure to yourself Miss Martha 

199 


200 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


Hopkins. She had visited as far north as At- 
lanta; and she had relatives in Charleston, as 
she would have condescendingly informed arch- 
angels, principalities, powers, thrones, and do- 
minions. But she was n’t blessed with much of 
this world’s goods, and most of the time she 
stayed home and improved her mind. She took 
herself with profound seriousness. She seemed 
to think that the better part of wisdom consists 
in knowing who said this and who did nr’t say 
that — “ as Mr. Arnold Bennett expresses it,” 
“as Mr. H. G. Wells remarks,” “as Mr. James 
Huneker writes,” — she was the only person in all 
Hyndsville who could write up music and art, 
and she was n’t even afraid to use the word sex 
in its most modern acceptance; though in South 
Carolina you refer to the ladies as “ the fair sex ” 
if you ’re a gentleman, and to the gentlemen as 
“ the stronger sex ” if you ’re a lady. You un- 
derstand that “male and female created He 
them,” and you let it go at that. Miss Martha 
Hopkins, then, was daring; she was also ex- 
clusive. 

I suppose if I had been younger I could have 
smiled at Miss Martha, as Susy Gatehell and her 
graceless friends did, but somehow she appeared 
to me a creature trying to peck at the world 
and peek at the stars through the bars of a bird- 
cage. That ’s why, when I met her a morning or 


THE JINNEE INTERVENES 201 


two before tbe Morenas exhibit, I asked her if she 
would n’t like to see it. I knew that, once asked, 
she could be kept away by nothing short of an 
earthquake or a deluge. Yet — 

“ Thank you, Miss Smith, I shall be glad to 
look over the sketches.” And she added blandly : 
“ Four O'clock, did you say? Very well, I will 
come. It is one’s moral duty to encourage men 
of talent.” 

“ Whoop ! ” cried The Author, joyously, when 
I told him that. “Revenge yourself, Morenas: 
sketch her, man ! sketch her ! ” 

Morenas laughed. “ Put her in one of your 
books and make her talk,” he suggested slyly. 
“ You have a genius for making a woman talk 
like an idiot.” 

“ That ’s because he does the talking for her, 
himself,” said Alicia, impudently. 

“ It pays, it pays ! ” smiled The Author. “ I 
draw from life.” 

“Nature-fakir! ” Alicia mocked. 

“ My dear fellow^, I draw. Yon draw and 
quarter,” said Morenas. 

The Author flung out his arms, grandilo- 
quently. 

You may as well try to change the 
Of yonder sun 

To north and south, 

As to try to subdue by criticism 


202 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


This heart of verse, 

Or close this mouth ! 

he cried, thumping his chest. “ Come on, John- 
son : let ’s leave these knockers to fate — and 
Miss Martha Hopkins ! ” 

Miss Martha Hopkins came, she saw, and she 
had a perfectly beautiful time. As a matter of 
fact, everybody that could come, did come. And 
the very smartest and prettiest of the younger 
set served tea. Oh, yes, decidedly the tables 
were turning! 

Despite which, Alicia and I were not happy. 
It seemed to me that a veil had fallen between 
us, for we were shy with each other. Both suf- 
fered, and each dreaded that the other should 
know. 

I was grateful that The Author’s mind was too 
taken up with Hynds House history to focus it- 
self upon us. The Author spent his spare hours 
rummaging through such dusty and musty rec- 
ords as might throw some light upon the 
Hyndses. In the old office were many faded 
plantation and household books, and he was able 
to glean enough from these to confirm the 
methodical carefulness of Freeman Hynds. 
There were, too, dry receipts for “ monies Paid 
by Mr. Rich. Hynds” for some old slave; or a 
brief notice that “ By Orders Mr. Richd. Hynds, 
no Women shall be Whipt ” ; or “ Bought by Mr. 


THE JINNEE INTERVENES 203 


R. Hynds & Charg’d to his Acct., one Crippl’d 
Black Childe nam’d Scipio from Vanham’s Sale, 
& Given to Sukey his Mother.” Another time it 
would he a list of Christmas gifts : “ One Col- 
our’d Head Kerchief for Nancy. One Flute for 
Blind Sam. One Shoulder Cape for Kitty my 
Nurse. One Horn-handl’d Knife for Agrippa. 
One Pckt. Tobacco & a Jorum of Rum for 
Shooba.” 

Over against these items were others : “ By 
Orders Mr. Freeman Hynds, Juba to Receive 
Twenty light Lashes for Malingering ; Black Tom 
to be Shipt to River Bottom Plantation for the 
Chastning of his Spiritt; Bread & Water & Irons 
3 Dayes & Nights for Shooba for Frighting of 
his Fellowes & other Evil Behaviour.” 

This was interesting enough, but not con- 
clusive. All that The Author could find only 
deepened his uncertainty, and this made him 
abominably cross, an ill temper increased by the 
presence of Mr. Nicholas Jelnik, who came and 
went, unruffled, aloof, with inscrutable eyes and 
a gently mocking smile. 

The Harrison-Gores came shortly after Mor- 
enas left. The Englishman was a pink-faced old 
gentleman in a shabby Norfolk suit and with the 
very thinnest legs on record — “ mocking-bird 
legs,” Fernolia called them. His daughter was 
a gray-eyed Minerva with the skin of a baby and 


204 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


the walk of a Highland piper. They found Caro- 
lina people charming, and they secured some val- 
uable data for their book, “ The Beginnings of 
American History.” Everything in Hynds 
House pleased them, even The Author. 

Other people who do not enter into this story 
came and went during that winter. But they 
were merely millionaires — people who motored 
around the lovely country, ate Mary Magdalen’s 
hot biscuit and fried chicken, slept in our four- 
posters, paid their stiff bills thankfully, and 
went about their business as good millionaires 
should, and generally do. Only one out of them 
all was disagreeable; he wanted to buy Hynds 
House out of hand for a proposed club of which 
he was to be founder and president. 

“ It ’d be just what the bunch would like,” he 
told me. “ All we ’d have to do would be to 
paint these wooden walls a nice cheerful light 
color, change one room into a smoker, another 
into a billiard-room, and a third into a grill, 
add some gun-racks and leather wing-chairs, 
and we’d be right up to the minute in club- 
houses ! ” 

When I explained that I couldn’t sell he of- 
fered to compromise on two of the carved marble 
mantels, the library tiles, and two inlaid tables, 
“ at double what you 'd get from anybody else.” 
And when I wouldn’t even let him have these 


THE JINNEE INTERVENES 205 


trifles, he was disgusted and took no pains to con- 
ceal it. He was rude to Alicia, who snubbed 
him with terrible thoroughness, a proceeding 
which made him call loudly for his “ bill ” and 
his car. The last we heard of him was his bully- 
ing voice bawling at his sullen chauffeur. 

“ That pig,” said The Author to me, with fury, 
“ is undoubtedly the lineal descendant of the one 
Gadarene swine that had n’t decency enough to 
rush down the slope with the rest of the herd and 
drown himself.” 

Busy as I was, it was n’t over easy for me to 
find time to revisit that brown and sweet-smell- 
ing spot in the Forest of Arden where on a gray 
afternoon, I had met Nicholas Jelnik and re- 
ceived from him a kiss on the palm, and a broken 
coin. And I wanted to go back there, as ghosts 
may desire to revisit the glimpses of the moon. 

That is why, on the first free afternoon I had, 
I changed into the selfsame brown frock, put on 
the brown hat with the yellow quill in it, and 
slipped out of Hynds House alone. It was n’t a 
gray afternoon this time, but a clear, bright, sun- 
shiny one, all blue and gold and green, and with 
the pleasantest of friendly winds a-frolicking, 
and a pine-scented air with a pungent and a 
vital bite to it. 

I went along the highroad for a while, crossed 
the weedy, ferny ditch that separated it from the 


206 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


fallow fields beyond, and struck into the deserted 
foot-path that leads to the Enchanted Wood. 

It was very lonesome, very peaceful. I could 
see the pine-trees I love swaying and rocking 
against the blue, blue sky ; I could catch the low- 
hummed tune they crooned to themselves and the 
winds; I could sniff a thousand woodsy odors. 
Spears of sunlight made bright blobs on the 
brown grass; and every littlest bush and shrub 
wore a shimmering halo, as you see the blessed 
ones backgrounded in old pictures. There was a 
bird twittering somewhere; occasionally a twig 
snapped with a quick, secret sharpness ; and once 
a thin brown rabbit took to his heels, right under 
my feet. 

I stopped from time to time to sense the feel of 
the afternoon, to drink the air and be healed. In 
a few minutes I should be within the forest and 
hear the little brook giggling to itself as it scur- 
ried over its brown pathway. And then I heard 
— something — and turned. 

The deep and weedy ditch, crowded with high 
stalks of last year’s goldenrod and fennel, edged 
all that pathway, draining the entire field. 
Crawling snakelike through it he had followed 
me. And now here he was, suddenly erect on the 
path behind me, looking at me with narrowed 
eyes under his flat forehead. 

I was n’t afraid — at first. Nothing like him 


THE JINNEE INTERVENES 207 


had ever crossed my path, and I stared at him 
with more of disgust and aversion than terror. 

He was tall and bony, immensely powerful, 
and his black skin showed with a grayish shine 
upon it through the rents in his rags. His gray- 
black, horny toes protruded through what once 
had been shoes, and a shapeless, colorless felt 
hat covered his bullet head. His corded black 
arms emerged from the torn sleeves of his 
checked shirt, and his hairy chest was naked. 
There came from him an indescribable reek of 
tobacco, whisky, filthy clothes, and the beastlike 
odor of an unclean body. He was beardless, and 
his gorilia-like nostrils twitched, his forehead 
wrinkled. His eyes were mere pin-points, with a 
sort of red glare far back in them ; his mouth was 
like a dirty red muzzle. He was a prowling 
tramp, of the worst sort. 

Involuntarily he stopped in his tracks as I 
faced him, his hands hanging loosely at his sides. 
His eyes swept greedily over me — silver mesh- 
purse, wrist-watch, the brooch at my throat, the 
rings on my fingers. 

“ Whut yuh doin’ hyuh, w’ite lady? ” he asked 
in a thick voice, and grinned. And quite sud- 
denly such a fear as I had not dreamed could be 
felt by a mortal took me by the heart and 
squeezed it as with an iron hand. 

“ Whut foh yuh come by mah field, lil w’ite 


208 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


lady?” he purred. “Ah’m takin’ lil snooze in 
de ditch grass, an’ dey yuh comes, wakin’ me up ! 
Whut yuh wake me up for, w’ite gal? ” Leering, 
he began with a gliding, stealthy movement to ad- 
vance. 

“ Stop ! ” cried I, in a voice that was n’t mine, 
it was so sharp and thin and reedy. “ Go back 
— where you came from ! Don’t you dare to take 
another step ! Go back ! ” 

The hands hooked into outstretched claws. 
His head sunk between his shoulders. Of the 
eyes, only red pin-points showed in the twitching 
face. I stood stone-still, struck into utter immo- 
bility. My brain was trying to urge me to fly, 
fly ! This is the Black Death, Sophy ! the Black 
Death! 

He, too, stood of a sudden stone-still, as if 
rooted to the ground. His eyes widened, and 
stared, as if he saw something over and beyond 
me. I did n’t dare turn my head. It might be a 
trick, to divert attention for a fatal second. 

The claws clenched into balled fists, the lips 
drew back, showing blackened and decayed teeth. 
Bristling like an aroused beast, his forehead 
wrinkling, his nostrils twitching, he made an in- 
articulate, growling, brute-like noise in his 
throat. His head twisted sideways. Of a sud- 
den the sweat burst out upon his face, and he be- 
gan to back away, warily. 


THE JINNEE INTERVENES 209 


And then something swift and dark sped by, 
bounding on light and flying feet; something 
that must have come from my forest. It was The 
Jinnee! God be praised, it was The Jinnee, his 
dark robe giving an odd effect of flying, his eyes 
living vengeance, his face like Fate carved in 
ebony. 

I saw T him leap, and close in upon the horror ; 
I heard a sort of wolfish yapping. The 
Black Death disappeared. And then I, too, 
w T as falling, falling into infinite blackness and 
blankness, with one red flash when I struck my 
head. 

Half-conscious, half -hearing, altogether unsee- 
ing, I thought there were two Voices near me. I 
could n’t understand what they said. One of the 
Voices was gently and persistently applying cold 
and soothing applications to my forehead. An- 
other Voice chafed my hands. I thought one 
said, “ Achmet,” and the other replied, “ Sahib.” 
I knew I must be dreaming. But it was a pleas- 
ant dream enough. 

Quite suddenly somebody said in good, anxious 
English : 

“ Thank God ! you are better ! ” 

I had opened my eyes. There was the whish- 
whish-whishing little brook, the good brown 
pines, with their heavenly odor. And there was 
the face of Nicholas Jelnik, bent over me. And 


210 A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 

beside him, gravely concerned and troubled, 
Boris. 

I looked from one to the other, both so clear- 
eyed, so kind, so safe ; and then I remembered. 

“ Sophy ! Sophy ! ” He had his arms around 
me, in a close, protecting clasp, while Boris 
pawed my skirts, and cried over me in loving, 
honest dog fashion, and licked my wet cheek with 
his affectionate tongue. I slipped my arm 
around the big dog’s neck, and clung to the two 
of them. And it seemed to me that while I clung 
thus, with my head bent and my face hidden, one 
of them kissed my hair. 

"It never occurred to me — that there might 
be danger for you,” he was whispering. “ To 
have that horror come near you — oh, my God ! 
Oh, my God ! ” 

I was terrified at sight of his face, dead-white, 
with eyes of steel, and straight lips, and pinched 
nostrils; the terrible face of the avenging white 
man, a face as inexorable as judgment. I hid 
my own before it, and trembled ; and yet was glad 
that I had seen it. 

I stammered : “ There was — a devil — and 
then a Jinnee came. And I heard — sounds. 
Then I fell. Did — did The Jinnee — ” My 
Voice died in my throat. 

His eyes were ice, his mouth a grim, pale 
line. 


THE JINNEE INTERVENES 211 

“ That has been attended to,” he said com- 
posedly. 

He blamed himself for having been thuoght- 
less. “ But I was so glad to have you come 
here, that afternoon, that I could think of noth- 
ing else ! ” And it seemed that this particular 
bit of woodland was his, bought because its quiet 
beauty pleased him. He was in the habit of com- 
ing here frequently ; it had never occurred to him 
that danger could lurk near it. 

“ I thought I heard — somebody calling some- 
body else ‘ Ackmet.’ ” I told him, confusedly. 
u And there was a Jinnee, really there was. And 
two Voices. Who brought me here? Did you 
find me, over there? ” 

“ You were not hard to carry,” he said eva- 
sively. 

“ But The Jinnee? ” 

“ The Jinnee did exactly what a good Jinnee 
always does, his duty. Having done it, he dis- 
appeared. Did n’t I tell you you ’re not to think 
of what ’s happened? It is finished,” said Mr. 
Jelnik, peremptorily. 

I asked no more questions. 

“ Do you think you are able to walk now? ” 
he asked. 

I tried to, with shaking knees. At the edge 
of the field I grew faint again, and staggered, and 
was unpleasantly sick. 


212 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


“ You simply cannot appear in Hynds House in 
this shape, and invite comment and question/’ 
said Mr. Jelnik, anxiously. His fine brows 
wrinkled. “ I have it : you will stop at my house 
for a few minutes, and I ’ll give you a cordial, 
that will put you to rights.” 

I went staggering along beside him, making 
desperate efforts to hold myself erect. The 
pathway squirmed and wriggled like a snake, the 
trees and bushes bowed, the sky bobbed up and 
down. 

He took me by by-paths so cunningly hidden 
that you might pass up and down the highroad 
daily and never suspect their existence. We 
went between cassenas and cedars and young 
laurels, branchy to the roots. And then I was 
walking down a path bordered with Lombardy 
poplars; and then I was sitting on a couch in Mr. 
Jelnik’s living-room, while he bathed my face 
with scented water, and afterward held a small 
glass to my lips. The fluid I swallowed went 
tingling through my whole body like friendly 
fire. 

I stole a woman-glance around the room that 
The Author had been so anxious to investigate. 
It was altogether a man’s room, the scoured floor 
partly covered with a handsome rug, and the 
divan on which I was sitting covered with an- 
other. On both sides of the big fireplace were 


THE JINNEE INTERVENES 213 


crowded book-shelves, above which hung weapons 
gathered from the four corners of the earth. 
There were two or three deep, comfortable arm- 
chairs, a square table, a couple of Winchesters 
in a corner, and near the window a flat, old-fash- 
ioned desk, above which hung two small por- 
traits, evidently his parents, for the gentleman 
with stars and crosses on his braided uniform, a 
sword at his side, and a plumed hat in his hand, 
bore a striking resemblance to Mr. Jelnik; and 
the stately blond lady had a family resemblance 
to Doctor Richard Geddes. 

Mr. Jelnik touched a bell near the door, and a 
tall, copper-colored man in spotless white ap- 
peared. At the merest gesture of an uplifted 
finger the copper-colored one bowed, vanished, 
and returned ten minutes later with a tiny cup 
of black coffee and a couple of thin wafers. 

“ I shall have to insist upon the coffee ; and I 
advise the wafers,” said Mr. Jelnik, pleasantly. 
So I drank the coffee, nibbled the wafers, and felt 
better. 

The copper-colored man, standing still as a 
statue, waited until I had finished, took the cup, 
bowed, and disappeared. He was a stately im- 
pressive person, rather like a shah in disguise. 
Mr. Jelnik addressed him as “ Daoud.” 

I had risen. I was trying to straighten my 
sadly flattened brown hat, and to smooth my 


214 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


frock, stained with damp earth, and water. A 
quick step sounded on the porch, somebody 
knocked, and without waiting for an answer, 
opened the door, impatiently, and strode into the 
room. With a fold of my disheveled frock in my 
hand, I looked up and met the angry and aston- 
ished eyes of The Author. 


CHAPTER XII 


MAN PROPOSES 

T HE Author closed the door and leaned 
against it. His piercing glance jumped 
from Nicholas Jelnik’s face to mine, with a pro- 
longed and savage scrutiny. No detail of my 
appearance escaped him — my reddened eyelids, 
my pallor, my nervousness, my dishevelment. 
His eyes narrowed, his jaw hardened. 

“What are you doing here?” he demanded, 
roughly. “ Come ! At least one may hope for 
the truth from you! ” 

Mr. Jelnik gave him a level look. There was 
that in it which brought an angry red to The 
Authors thin face. 

“ Let me answer for her : just at present Miss 
Smith is getting ready to go home.” 

The Author struggled to keep his rising temper 
in hand. 

“ I asked you a plain question, Miss Smith ! ” 
His peremptory tone jangled my strained nerves. 

“Mr. Jelnik has answered you: I am getting 
ready to go home.” 


215 


216 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


The Author stamped. 

“ Don’t talk nonsense ! Again I ask you, what 
are you doing here? Have you lost your senses? 
Why have you been w r eeping? It is plain that 
you have been weeping. Miss Smith, why do I 
find you here — alone? ” 

“ I do not like your manner of questioning 
me,” I said, indignantly. 

“ My dear fellow,” protested Mr. Jelnik, “ you 
are behaving unmannerly, you know. The sim- 
ple truth is, I was so fortunate as to be of assist- 
ance to Miss Smith. She had an unpleasant ex- 
perience — fell and gave her head such a nasty 
bump, that it made her faint. I 'm afraid I 
splashed her a bit when I was trying to revive 
her. I thought best to bring her here and give 
her a stimulant. She did n’t want to stagger 
home and alarm the whole household unneces- 
sarily.” 

“ Is this true? ” The Author asked me, rudely. 

“ You heard what Mr. Jelnik said! ” I flamed. 

“ One allows somewhat more license to genius 
than might be accorded ordinary mortals; but 
really, you know, there are limits,” Mr. Jelnik 
reminded him. “ You ’re beginning to be rather 
a nuisance. It ’s unfortunate to have to remind 
a man, in one’s own house, that he ’s a nuisance.” 

“ I think you are, too! ” I told The Author — 
“ bursting into people’s houses like an East-Side 


MAN PROPOSES 


217 


policeman, asking outrageous questions in an 
outrageous manner, and then questioning the an- 
swers one is patient enough to give you ! What 
right have you got to ask any questions? ” 

“ I ’d rather like to know that, myself,” put in 
Mr. Jelnik. 

The Author straightened his shoulders, drew 
himself up to his full height, and folded his arms. 
He is an impressively tall man. 

“ Should you? ” said he, quietly. “ Well, I ’ll 
tell you — the right of an honest man to protect 
the woman he happens to want to marry.” 

I sat down, suddenly. I ’m afraid my eyes 
popped, and I know my mouth fell open. I had 
the doubtful satisfaction of seeing Mr. Nicholas 
Jelnik’s eyes and mouth open, too. After an 
astounded moment : 

“ Is n’t this rather sudden? ” wondered Mr. 
J elnik. “ Who ’d suspect this fellow of volcanic 
possibilities? ” 

“ I do Miss Smith no dishonor when I ask her 
to be my wife,” said The Author, haughtily. “ I 
am no adventurer. She can never suspect me of 
ulterior motives ! ” 

“ Heavens, no ! Like Caesar’s wife, you are 
above suspicion; which, of course, gives you the 
right to suspect everybody else! But you were 
about to propose to Miss Smith in due form, were 
you not? Miss Smith, you will permit me to 


218 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


withdraw? I have never before been a third 
party to a proposal of marriage, and I confess I 
do not exactly understand what is expected of 
me,” said Mr. Jelnik, delicately. 

The Author smiled wryly. 

“ You succeed in making me appear a fool,” he 
admitted. “ That is no mean achievement, 
young man ! I merely wished to set myself 
straight with Miss Smith, to leave her no room 
for doubt as to my absolute honesty of purpose 
toward her ; and you,” said The Author, gulping, 
“you have made me bray! I wish you’d clear 
out. You are in the way, if you want the truth. 
And,” he added, clenching his hands, “ you can 
think yourself lucky that you ’re getting out with 
a whole skin, da — confound you ! ” 

Mr. Jelnik smiled so sweetly that I was terri- 
fied. 

“ Oh, a whole skin ! ” he repeated, thoughtfully. 
“ My good sir, I was born with a whole skin, and 
I rather expect to die with one.” He looked at 
The Author reflectively : “ Of course, I don’t 
know what Miss Smith’s feelings may be in re- 
gard to you, but if I thought you were seriously 
annoying her, I give you my word I should pitch 
you out of the window without further ado. 
Miss Smith,” he turned to me, his eyes gentling 
with compassion, “ I am more sorry than I can 
say that you should be called upon to endure this 


MAN PKOPOSES 


219 


further strain. You will, I trust, forgive my un- 
willing share in it. Now, shall I leave you? ” 

“ No, stay,” said I, flatly. 

Mr. Jelnik sat down, and with unruffled com- 
posure, waited for The Author to unbosom him- 
self further. 

“ Miss Smith,” The Author spoke after a pause, 
— and oh, I give him credit for his courage at 
that trying moment! — “ Miss Smith, I have 
placed myself, and you also, in what appears to 
be rather an absurd position. I am sorry. But 
I meant exactly what I said. I base my right 
to question you upon the fact that I intended 
asking you to marry me. You need a protector, 
if ever woman did. I offer you the protection of 
my name.” 

I sat on the divan and stared at him owlishly. 
He went striding up and down the room, pausing 
every now and then to look down at me. 

“When I came to Hyndsville,” he went on, 
“ nothing was farther from my thoughts than the 
desire to marry anybody. I have never con- 
sidered myself a marrying man. But I find my- 
self liking you, Miss Smith, better than I have 
ever liked any other woman, and for better rea- 
sons. You would make me an excellent wife, 
the only sort of wife a man like me could endure. 
And I think I should make you a good husband. 
I am not really so great a bear,” he added, 


220 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


hastily, “as at times I appear to be. I should 
really try to make you happy. Now then, what 
have you to say? ” 

What could any woman say in such circum- 
stances? I said nothing, but slid down on Nich- 
olas Jelnik’s divan and howled. 

“ Did n’t I tell you she ’d had a bad time and 
was n’t herself? Now I hope you ’re satisfied! ” 
raged Mr. Jelnik. 

“ It ’s as much your fault as mine ! ” snarled 
The Author. “Miss Smith, for heaven’s sake 
don’t cry like that ! My dear girl, stop it. You 
run me distracted, Miss Smith ! — Give her 
some vinegar or something, Jelnik! Confound 
you, Jelnik! — why don’t you do something? 
Burn a feather under her nose! Make her stop 
it, Jelnik ! She ’ll kill herself, if she keeps on 
crying like that ! Here ! ” cried The Author, 
desperately ; and tried to push back my hair and 
all but scalped me. 

“Get away!” said Mr. Jelnik. “I’ll try to 
quiet her. Miss Smith, if you don’t stop crying, 
I shall slap you ! Do you understand me, Miss 
Smith? Stop it this minute, or I shall slap 
you ! ” He thrust an arm around my shoulders 
and pulled me erect, none too gently. 

— j — i ca-ca-ca — n’t ! ” 

“You can!” he snapped. “Stop it! Sophy, 
shut up ! ” 


MAN PROPOSES 


221 


I was so astonished that in the middle of a 
howl I blinked, and gasped, and gulped, and 
stopped ! 

“ Ring the bell, by the door/’ Mr. Jelnik told 
The Author, curtly. And when Daoud appeared, 
he ordered : “ Cordial — top shelf ; and some ice- 
water. 

Five minutes later a forlorn and red-eyed 
wreck was sitting up looking at two wretched, 
embarrassed men. Thank Heaven, they looked 
just as miserable as they should have felt! 
Daoud brought me scented water, and I bathed 
my face. Then I patted into shape the hair that 
The Author had pulled awry, and said in the cold, 
accusing, I-die-a-martyr-to-your-stupidity voice 
that women punish men with : 

“ I think I shall go home.” 

With a chastened, hang dog air The Author 
rose to accompany me, casting a withering look 
upon Mr. Nicholas Jelnik, who despised The Au- 
thor for a bungling and intrusive idiot, and let 
his glance convey the fact. He was sorry for me, 
with a compassionate understanding of what I 
had been through. But I wanted neither his 
sorrow nor his compassion. He had punished 
The Author, but he had n’t saved me from a 
ridiculous and painful situation. I gave him a 
limp hand, and had the satisfaction of leaving 
him thoroughly uncomfortable. 


222 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


When we reached onr gate The Author, who 
had trudged beside me in gloomy silence, laid his 
hand upon my arm. 

“ I shall not ask you to answer me at once. 
But I do ask you to consider carefully w r hat I 
have said, and to realize that I mean every word 
of it. And — and — I’m sorry it came about in 
this wise, Sophy,” he finished, with a touch of 
compunction. 

“ So am I.” And then I went up-stairs, and 
crept into bed. My head ached frightfully, my 
heart throbbed and fluttered. I was so unnerved 
that it seemed a burden to be alive. And then, 
mercifully, I fell asleep, and did n’t wake until 
Alicia brought me a breakfast-tray the next 
morning. 

“ My goodness, Sophy, you must have had a 
terrific headache ! ” she exclaimed. “ Why, your 
lips are bloodless, and you ’ve black circles under 
your eyes ! ” 

“ I ’m all right this morning,” I said, hastily. 
“ But you look pale, yourself. Are n’t you 
rather overdoing things, Leetchy? ” 

“No: I’m as sound as a trivet!” said she. 
And then : “ Sophy, guess who was here last 
evening.” Her eyes began to shine. “ Mrs. 
Cheshire Scarboro ; no less ! ” And she paused, 
to let that highly important statement sink 
in. 


MAN PROPOSES 


223 


Mrs. Cheshire Scarboro was the Leader of the 
Opposition. She ’d had a lifelong feud with old 
Sophronisba, who said that when the Lord 
wanted to try himself out in the way of a fool, 
He made Cissy Scarboro. They hated each 
other as only relations can hate. Naturally, 
Mrs. Scarboro resented our presence in Hynds 
House. She said Hyndsville ought to show us 
what it thought of the outrage. Under her 
leadership, Hyndsville showed us. 

Mrs. Scarboro was a very important person in 
Hyndsville. She ruled the older and more con- 
servative portion of it, and although the younger 
set at times rebelled and went its own way, her 
power was very real. That she had changed her 
mind, or at least her tactics, in regard to us was 
important news. 

“ She came with Mr. and Mrs. Haile, 1 ” Alicia 
continued. “ It was the first time she had ever 
been inside Hynds House. Think of that, 
Sophy! There were some girls here, and a few 
boys, naturally, Jimmy Scarboro among them. 
Should you think that accounted for his mama’s 
presence, Sophy? And we sat around like ador 
ing mice, listening to The Author’s sky-rockets 
going off. Doctor Geddes would n’t let us sing, 
would n’t even let us have music, because you 
must n’t be disturbed. He thinks a whole lot of 
you, Sophy.” 


224 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


“ I think a whole lot of him. I never thought 
I could like that man as much as I do.” 

I was determined to show Miss Alicia Gaines 
that no matter how much, or for whatever rea- 
sons she had changed for the worse toward him, 
I, at least, had changed for the better. But she 
listened listlessly. For which cause, being re- 
sentful, I said not one word to her about The 
Author. 

The thought of The Author confused me. I 
was n’t so much flattered as astounded. He was 
not offering me a light honor: The Author’s 
name meant a great deal. Who, then, was I, a 
woman named Smith, to say nay to this miracu- 
lous possibility? Was it not rather for me to ac- 
cept, meekly, the high gift that the gods in a 
sportive moment chose to toss to me? Yea, 
verily. And yet — My hand stole to the half 
of a thin old foreign coin hidden in my breast. 

The Author behaved with exemplary patience 
and dignity. He went about his own work and 
left me to mine, and though I knew I was under 
his hawklike watchfulness, his matter-of-fact 
manner set me at my ease. You can’t dread to 
meet a man, of a morning, who pays more atten- 
tion to his batter-cakes than to you. 

I was just beginning to breathe freely, when 
Doctor Richard Geddes came over one afternoon, 
and, finding me in our living-room with only 


MAN PROPOSES 


225 


the Black family to keep me company, flung him- 
self into an arm-chair, seized Sir Thomas More 
Black by the scruff, and pulled his whiskers and 
rubbed his fur the wrong way until Sir Thomas 
More scratched him with thoroughness. 

“ Get out, then, you black hellion ! ” growled 
the doctor. Sir Thomas More got out. He 
had n’t wanted to stay in the first place. 

“ Shall I bind your hand for you? ” I asked. 
But the doctor refused. He tapped his foot on 
the floor, and hemmed, and looked at me 
strangely. Then : 

“ Sophronisba Two, you consider me a reason- 
ably decent sort, don’t you? ” 

“ That goes without saying.” 

“ Think I ’d make a woman a reasonably good 
husband? ” 

“ I do,” said I, truthfully. Whatever ailed 
the man? 

“ Good ! And I,” the doctor said, deliberately, 
“ know that you ’d make any man more than a 
reasonably good wife. Should you like to be 
mine, Sophronisba Two? ” 

The jump I gave threw Potty Black off my 
knees. 

“ You ’re ill, wandering in your wits, you poor 
man ! ” I was genuinely alarmed. “ Is n’t there 
something I can do for you, doctor? ” 

“ There is : you can marry me, if you want to,” 


226 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


replied the doctor, soberly. “ Honestly, my dear 
girl, I ’d be kind to you. I like and admire and 
respect you more than I can tell you, Sophy.” 

“ My dear friend,” I said, when I caught my 
breath, “ I like, admire, and respect you, too. 
But people who marry each other need some- 
thing more than that. They — well, they need 
— love.” 

His shoulders twitched. 

“ This business of love is the devil’s own in- 
vention ! ” he cried. “ It ’s safer and saner to 
like and respect people than to love them, and 
lots harder. Now, what do you say to marry- 
ing me? ” 

“ I say you had no such notion in your head 
the last time you and I talked together. When 
did it seize you?” I demanded, suspiciously. 

“ I began to think about it seriously — er — 
ah — some days ago,” he said, reddening. 

“ What day, to be exact? ” 

“ Well,” said he, resentfully, “ it occurred to 
me last Wednesday, if you want to be so all-fired 
sure ! ” 

“ What happened last Wednesday to make you 
think of asking me to marry you? ” 

The doctor looked at me very much as a little 
boy looks at a grown-up who is holding a soapy 
wash-cloth in one hand and an ear in the other. 

“ What do you want to know for? ” 


MAN PROPOSES 


227 


“ Because. I just want to know because. 
Well?” He squirmed, and was silent. “ Was 
it because you have ceased to care for Alicia, al- 
ready? ” His glare answered that question. 
“No? Why, then, didn’t you ask Alicia, in- 
stead of coming to me for second choice? Look 
here, Doctor Richard Geddes : if I was not firmly 
and truly your friend, I should be furious, do you 
understand? Or,” I added, darkly, “I might 
even revenge myself by taking you at your 
word ! ” 

“ Sophronisba Two ! ” The doctor looked at 
me piteously. 

“ Why did n’t you ask Alicia? ” I persisted, in- 
exorably. 

“ I did ! ” gulped the doctor. “ But she said 
she couldn’t. She said, why didn’t I care for 
you instead of her? You were so much better 
— and — and I ’d be happier with you, for I ’d 
have the most unselfish angel — ” he stopped 
miserably. 

“ Well? ” 

“ Well, I kept turning it over in my mind; and 
the more I thought of it, the clearer I perceived 
that with a wife like you I ’d be a better and a 
more w r ort*h- while man. I — I think so much of 
you, Sophy, that I ’m telling you the whole 
truth,” he finished. 

“ That ’s why I ’m going to keep on being 


228 A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 

friends with you — better friends than ever,” I 
told him. 

“ You ’re going to marry me, then, Sophy? ” 

“ Did n’t you just hear me tell you I meant to 
keep on being friends with you? ” 

“ You won’t, then? ” 

“ I won’t, then.” 

“ Yet there are good reasons why you might re- 
consider your decisidh,” he said, after a pause. 
“ We are so diametrically opposed it would seem 
inevitable we should marry each other. Why, 
Sophy, we 've got enough to quarrel happily 
about for the rest of our lives. For instance, do 
you sleep with all your windows open?” 

“ I close two, and leave two open.” 

“ Every window open, day and night, hot or 
cold, rain or shine,” said the doctor, firmly. 
“ Do you use pillows? ” 

“ Two.” 

“ None at all. Sleep with your head flat. 
How many blankets? ” 

“ Two, and a comfort.” 

“ One army blanket, except in extremely cold 
weather,” said the doctor. “ Do you like a 
pipe? ” 

“ It always makes me sick. I peculiarly and 
particularly loathe and detest a pipe.” 

“A pipe, my dear, deluded woman, is a com- 
fort, a stay, a prop to a man's soul, an aid to 


MAN PROPOSES 


229 


meditation and repose. I insist upon a pipe — 
within moderation, of course. Do you like par- 
rots? Sophy, are you capable of supporting a 
parrot ? I have already perceived your reprehen- 
sible fondness for cats.” He looked at his 
scratched hand. 

“ I have always wanted a parrot. I think 
they ’re the most — ” 

“ Damnable brutes ! ” finished the doctor. 
“ Gad, I ’d as lief live in the house with Sophro- 
nisba One! It is not moral to like a parrot. 
What do you think of stewed rhubarb?” 

I made a wry face. I abhor stewed rhubarb. 
Somehow, it always makes me think of orphans 
in long-waisted gingham dresses with white china 
buttons down the back. One way of punishing 
children for losing their parents is to make them 
wear dark gingham dresses with china buttons 
down the back and to eat stewed rhubarb for 
dessert. 

“ Tell me what you eat and I ’ll tell you what 
you are,” pronounced the doctor. “ It ’s a sign 
of moral rectitude to eat stewed rhubarb. Now, 
as to science : what is your attitude toward evolu- 
tion ? ” 

“ Well, I think plenty of men turn themselves 
into monkeys, but I refuse to believe that God 
ever turned a monkey into a man.” 

“ Ha ! ” mused the doctor, pulling his nose ; “ I 


230 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


see ! Do you insist upon a sacrosanct meal 
hour? Are your meal hours fixed, even as the 
laws of the Medes and the Persians? ” 

“ How else, pray, shall one run one’s house 
with any degree of system?” I wanted to 
know. 

“ Bunk ! ” snorted the doctor. “ I eat when 
I’m hungry! Now, lastly, sister, tell me truth- 
fully : are you a Democrat or a Republican? ” 

“ I don’t see much difference : they ’re both of 
them nothing but men.” 

“ I knew it ! ” The doctor shook his head with 
sad triumph. “ She ’d scratch Brown, because 
she did n’t like the expression of his ears, and 
vote for Jones, because he had such beautiful 
whiskers! My dear, dear woman, can’t you see 
that it ’s almost a law of nature for you and me, 
who don’t agree about anything, to marry each 
other? ” 

“ I don’t even agree with you as to that ! ” 
said I, and fell into helpless laughter. 

“ It rather looks like flying in the face of 
Providence not to,” he warned me. “ In the 
meantime — ” 

“ In the meantime, let us be grateful Alicia 
didn’t put the notion into your head to ask 
somebody who might have taken you seriously.” 

“ That means you don’t, and won’t.” He drew 


MAN PROPOSES 231 

a long breath. “ But we ’re good Mends ; are n’t 
we, Sophy?” 

“ If a man never does anything worse than 
ask a woman to marry him, he will probably 
retain her friendship until she dies,” I replied. 

“ Provided she refuses him,” the doctor said, 
gratefully. And bending down, he kissed me 
brotherly on the cheek, an honest and resound- 
ing smack; at which opportune moment Alicia 
walked in. 

Wholly unabashed, the doctor spoke pleasantly 
to Alicia, shook hands with me effusively, and 
went off whistling. All was right with the 
world. I ’d refused him, you understand ! In- 
stead of being enraged and offended, I found 
myself giggling. 

That night, as Alicia did n’t come in my room, 
I went into hers. 

“ I know what you ’ve come to tell me, Sophy 
dear,” she said, directly. “ I ’ve seen it for some 
time. And I ’m glad as glad — glad with all 
my heart, Sophy.” Her voice was tenderness it- 
self, her eyes melted. But the hand on my hand 
was cold. “ I love you a great deal, Sophy,” she 
whispered. “ More than anybody else in the 
w r orld, I think.” 

“ And was it because you loved me, dear girl, 
that you put the absurd notion of asking me 


232 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


to marry him into Doctor Geddes’s head? ’’ 

u Absurd notion?” repeated Alicia. “ Ab- 
surd notion? But he asked you! Didn’t he 
ask you?” 

“ As to that, he told me I could marry him 
if I wanted to,” I admitted. “ Oh, Leetchy, it 
was funny, though ! If you could have seen the 
poor dear, trying to martyr himself, just to oblige 
you — ” 

“ You refused him? ” breathlessly. 

“ Of course. There was n’t anything to say 
but ‘No.’” 

“ But — I saw — ” 

“ You saw him kiss me on the cheek? Honey, 
that was n’t love : that was gratitude ! ” 

“ I don’t understand!” stammered Alicia, 
twisting her hands. “ Why, you cared for him 
— I thought you cared.” 

“ Of course I care for him ! But not like 
that! Good heavens, Alicia, however did you 
get such a notion? My dear, if I loved you 
less, or him more, I should never, never be able 
to forgive either of you. As it is, we ’ll forget 
it.” 

At that Alicia began to cry. 

“ Oh, what have I done? ” she whimpered. 
“ Sophy, you don’t know — what I ’ve done ! ” 

“ You have n’t done anything that can’t be 
undone,” said I, comfortably. “ You and I, m^ 


MAN PROPOSES 


233 


dear, fell into a Hynds House maze. Now 
we ’re out of it ! ” And thinking she would be 
better by herself, I kissed her good night. 

Out of Hynds House maze, indeed! I had 
only to step back into my own room to have 
it again enmesh me. For on the prie-dieu that 
had once held Freeman Hynds’s Bible and now 
held mine, was the lost diary. 


CHAPTER XIII 


FIRES OF YESTERDAY 

1 WAS N’T frightened, of course. There is n’t 
anything terrifying in finding a little old 
leather-covered hook on a prie-dieu by one ’s 
bedside. But it was some minutes before I 
could induce myself to take up that yellowed 
old diary and examine it. 

It begins the year of Freeman’s return from 
college, “ a Finish’d Young Gentleman.” He has 
refused to go abroad, considering that “ our 
Young Gentlemen have enough Fripperies & 
Fopperies at Home without bringing worse 
Ones from Abroad.” Brother Richard has been 
abroad more than once, and Freeman does not 
“ find him Improv’d save in Outer Elegancies.” 

The only person that “ much Travelling hath 
not Spoil’d,” he finds, is Mistress Emily Hope 
of Hope Plantation. “ Shee was a Sweet Child,” 
he remembers; and now that the dew of their 
youth is upon them both, he finds her “ of a 
Graceful and Delicate Shape, with the Most 
Beautiful Countenance in the World, a Sweet 
& Modest Demeanour, a Sprightly Wit, an Ac- 

234 


FIRES OF YESTERDAY 


235 


complish’d Mind, & a Heart Fix’d upon Virtue.” 

The estates are near each other, the families 
intimate friends. Emily seems to like the boy. 
At any rate, she does n’t repel him. And then 
returns Richard — the gay, the handsome, the 
irresistible Richard — who adds to the stalwart 
comeliness of a colonial gentleman the style, 
the grace, the cultivated manners of the Old 
World. 

Almost fiercely Freeman notes the effect he 
produces, and how “ Women do catch an Admira- 
tion for him as ’t were a Pox.” 

Then he begins to set down, grimly, “ The 
Sums my Father hath paid for My Brother’s 
Debts.” A little later, he adds : “ You Might 
Pour the Atlantic Ocean full of Gold through 
his Pocketts & Overnight would He empty 
Them.” Richard, also, “ Makes Choice of rake- 
hell Companions,” to his father’s growing un- 
ease and indignation, his mother’s distress. 
But “ Good God ! how is all Forgiven the Beau- 
tiful, the Gift’d ! ” 

“ Jezebel herself, that carries her Head so 
High, wears her Heart upon her Sleeve, een like 
a simple Milkmaid ! ’T is a Rare Spectacle. 
Sure there ’s a Fatality about this Man ! ” 

“ This Day dress’d I in my new Blue Cloathes, 
the which become me not 111 & riding over to 


236 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


Hope Plant’ll did ask for Emily’s Hand. Alas, 
’T is even as my Fears foretold ! Shee loves 
me Not. ’Tis Rickard alone hath her Heart. 

“ I do Fear Skee will sup Sorrow & drink Tears 
that setts her Affection upon the Unstable. 
Shee ’s too Mild, too Tender, hath not a Firm 
enough Hand to restrain him. He should een 
have ta'en Madame Jezebel. Hath a Grand 
Passion for him. Will not lightly wear the 
Willow.” 

“ This Day did Richard my Brother Wed 
Emily Hope,” he records, after a six-months’ 
silence. “All say ’t is a most Noble Mating. 
My Mother in a Gown from London Town, & 
our Finest Gems, enow to make a Dutchess en- 
vious of a Carolina Lady. My Father in high 
Spiritts. 

“ I danc’d with the Bridesmaids, but Salut’d 
not the Bride, the Which noted Madame Jezebel. 
W T as Handsomer than ever I did See her, many 
thinking her Handsomer than the Bride. Had 
a great Following, the which the Hussy treat’d 
with Disdain. 

“ ‘ Have you Kiss’d the Bride, Sir? ’ says shee, 
a-mocking of me after her Wont. ‘ What a Fine 
Thing is a Love-Match, Master Freeman!’ 

“ c Have you Wish’d the Bridegroom Joy?’ 
says I. The woman anger’d me. 


FIRES OF YESTERDAY 


237 


a 1 May Heaven send Mm all the Happiness 
he Deserves ! ’ cries shee. i Sure, you ’ll echo 
that yourself, Master Freeman ! 9 ’T is a jibing 
Wench. Would to God Richard had Wedded 
her! ” 

Then came dry notes of a visit to Kinsfolk in 
Virginia. Freeman seems to have been away 
from home for some time. When he returns, 
it is to chronicle in brief his brother’s down- 
ward course. “ They have sold Hope Plantation 
and Most of the Slaves. ’T is an evil Chance.” 

“ I shall be Twenty-one next month, though I 
feel a Thousand. We shall have a Ball, after the 
Custom of our House. ’T is to be a Grand Af- 
fair. I do think my Parents are somewhat Ten- 
der of Conscience to meward. Though my 
Father Loves me not as he Loves my Brother, yet 
he begins to Lean upon me more & More Heavily. 
My poor Mother is a Little Envious of these Dry 
Virtues of mine, seeing her Darling is like to 
come to Shipwreck for Lack of them. Yet had 
he Fortune & Beauty & Emily ! ” 

The next entry records the loss of the Hynds 
jewels. “ ’T is a great Mystery ! ” One is sorely 
puzzled here. There is no getting at what Free- 
man really thinks. Coldly, tritely, he sets down 
the bald, bare facts of the tragedies that wrecked 
the Hyndses. 

With a strange lack of emotion he chronicles 


238 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


Bichard’s death, and adds : “ At the Pleasure of 

God his Birth fell upon a Wednesday, at Sun- 
rising, the which was by some Accounted Favour- 
able. His Death came upon a Friday, at Noone, 
it Raining heavily.” 

Then comes his father's sudden death; and 
this curious item : 

“ Despite his Anguish & Affliction of Spiritt 
upon that Date, he did tell me Part, after the 
Custom of our House, the morning of my Twenty- 
first Birthday. Alas, when he was Stricken, 
upon the News of Richard’s Demise, lie had no 
Chance to tell me All, nor was there among 
his Papers the Keye nor any Clue to It. When 
J. call'd us, he was Beyond Speech & shee Hys- 
terical! with Affright. Thus the Whole Secret 
perishes, since Without the Keye & his Instruc- 
tions ’t would be Impossible to Proceed.” 

“ This evening came Capt. B., the w r orst of 
the Plundering Crew that pluck'd Richard. 
‘ Sirrah,’ says he, impudently, i thy Brother 
owe'd me three thousand pounds.’ And he pulls 
me out a great fistfull of Billets. 

“ ‘ Sirrah,’ says I, ‘ my Brother ow^es his Wife 
and Orphan’d Infant three thousand times more 
than that. There be Debts of Nature wdiich 
precede so-called Debts of Honour. Each billet 
in thy hand, thou swindling runnigate, calls for 


FIRES OF YESTERDAY 239 

a bullet. Begone, lest I owe thee a horse-whip- 
ping.’ 

“ ‘ Anan ! ’ says he, ‘ and one of you a Thief ! 
That for Honour, in the mouth of a Hynds!’ 
And snapp'd me his fingers under my Nose. 

“We arrang’d a Meeting, though ’T was Fool- 
ish to Risk myself, with the Roof tottering over 
my Mother’s Head. My fellow Pompey, Mr. G. 
Dalzell, Mr. F. Mayne, & Dr. Baltassar Bobo with 
me. Two of his scoundrelly Associates with him. 
His ball graz’d my arm above the Elbow & Burnt 
the Linen of my Shirt. Mine Finish’d him. 
’T was too great an Honour & more than he De- 
serv’d, to die by the Hand of a Gentleman.” 

A little later: “ This morn disappear’d my 
Cozen Jessamine. 

“ Nothing discover’d of her Whereabouts,” he 
records from time to time. 

“ This morn saw I Emily & Richard’s little 
Son. ’T is a Fine child, much Resembling my 
Brother. Emily turn’d her Face away, draw- 
ing down of her Widow’s Weeds, & turn’d also 
the Babe’s face aside. I felt Embitter’d.” 

By this time he has taken over the whole Hynds 
estate as heir. He mentions his sisters’ mar- 
riages, notes that they have received their dow- 
ers, and so dismisses them. 

His mother has been dead some time when he 
marries. One wonders what the bride was like, 


240 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


whom he commends for a Housekeeping Vir- 
tues, so that the Servants instantly Obey, there 
is no Pilfering & Loitering, & the House moves 
like Clockwork.” 

He must have been like clockwork, himself. 
There seems less and less human emotion in him. 
The birth of his only child gets this : 

“ This day was born Sophronisba Harriott 
Hynds, nam’d for her Estimable Mother. I am 
told ’T is a fine healthy Child.” 

Casually thereafter he mentions “ my Daugh- 
ter.” Twice her mother “ Request’d me to Chas- 
tise her for Unchristian Temper,” which chastise- 
ment he seems to have administered with thor- 
oughness and a rattan, in his office. On the sec- 
ond occasion, “ I whip’d her Severely & did at the 
same Time admonish her to Ask Pardon of God. 
Whereupon she Yell’d Aloud & did Seize the Calf 
of my Leg & Bite me, Causing me Great Physical 
Pain and Mental Anguish. How sharper than a 
Serpent’s Tooth is an Ungrateful Child ! ” 

(Oh, Ungrateful Child, I do not find it in my 
heart to blame you overmuch. Somehow I can’t 
feel sorry that you bit him, Sophronisba!) 

“ This day died my Wife, an Estimable Help- 
meet. I shall sadly Lack her Management of the 
House.” In spite of which, he buys more land. 
Life seems to run smoothly enough. " The Lord 
hath bless’d me with Abundance. They that 


FIRES OF YESTERDAY 241 

Spoke evil of me are Astonied & made Asham’d. 
The Lord hath done it.” 

Then comes this last entry: 

“ Two nights since died Scipio, son of old 
Shooba's last Wife, the which did send for me, 
Urgently entreating of my Presence. ’T was ever 
a Simple-minded Creature & found a faithful 
Servant, wherefore I did go to him. 

“ He was greatly in Dread of Dying, for that he 
was in mortal Terrour of old Shooba, fearing to 
Meet that Evil Being outside of the Flesh. Had 
been with Shooba when the wretched Creature 
passed away, a harden'd Heathen among Con- 
vert’d & Profess’d Christians. Said he was a 
Snake Soul. 

“ The man was craz’d with Fbar, dreading 
Shooba to be even then in the Room. And indeed 
the Tale he whisper’d me was enough to Craze a 
Christian Man, & hath all but crack’d mine own 
Witts. If 't were not for the Paper he slip’t into 
my Palm, I should sett it down for a Phantazy, 
one of old Shooba’s evil Spells. Most merciful 
God, how came he by that Paper if the Tale be 
untrue? 

“ Greatly am I upsett by this Improbable & 
Frightful Thing. Sure this requires Prayer & 
Fasting, lest I be Delud’d.” 

Between the pages following this last entry was 
a piece of yellowed paper, the paper that had been 


242 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


lost from the Author’s coat pocket, in the locked 
closet of his room. 

After a while I managed to work the slit of 
a drawer open, and to this hiding-place I re- 
turned Freeman’s diary, and with it the faintly 
scented bit of paper that The Author mourned. 

The failure of her matrimonial plans for me 
did not occasion Miss Alicia Gaines overmuch 
grief. She seemed to have dismissed the whole 
matter from her mind. Restored to her old time 
gaiety, she sang like a thrush as she worked. 
She bubbled over with the sheer joy of living, 
until the very sight of her gladdened one. And 
she simply could n’t make her feet behave! She 
danced with the broom one morning, to the great 
amusement of our scholarly old Englishman. 

“ I ’m supposed to be somewhat of an old stick 
myself : why not try me, instead of the broom? ” 
he suggested slyly. Instantly she took him at 
his word, and danced him up and down the hall 
until he was breathless. 

“ This,” panted the scholar, “ is a fair sample 
of what the Irish do to the English.” 

u We do lead you a pretty dance, don’t we, dear 
John Bull?” dimpled Alicia. 

“ You do, you engaging baggage! ” he admitted. 
“ But,” he added, in a tone of satisfaction, “ we 
manage to keep step, my dear ! Oh, yes, we mam 


FIRES OF YESTERDAY 243 

age to keep step ! ” And he trotted off, chuck- 
ling. 

“ There are times,” said The Author to me, 
darkly, “ when the terrifying tirelessness of youth 
gives me a vertigo. Come away, Miss Smith. 
Leave that kitten to chase her own shadow up the 
wall.” 


Cross-patch, draw the latch, 

Sit by the fire and spin — yarns! ” 

chanted Alicia. 

“ Go away, you pink-and-white delusion ! ” said 
The Author, severely. “ You have made Scholar- 
ship and Wisdom put on cap and bells and prance 
like a morris-dancer. Is n’t that mischief enough 
for one day? ” 

Alicia has a round, snow-white chin, and when 
she tilts it the curve of her throat is distracting. 

“ On second thoughts,” said The Author, criti- 
cally, “ I discover that I do not wholly disapprove 
of you. Come outside. I wish to talk about the 
venerable, and yet common design that tops every 
outside window and door of this house. — What 
do you call that design, may I ask?” 

“ Why, everybody knows the Greek fret ! ” said 
Alicia, staring at it. “ It ? s as old as the hills.” 

“ Exactly,” agreed The Author. “ The Greek 
fret is as old as the hill. And, with the single 
exception of the swastika, it is the design most 


244 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


universally known to man. You may find it on 
a bit of ancient Greek pottery, or on a crumbling 
wall in Yucatan. Many people refer to it as the 
Greek key.” 

Something began to glimmer in my mind — 
the vaguest, most tenuous shadow of an idea; a 
tantalizing, hide-and-seek phantom of a thought. 

tl Tume Hellens Keye 
Three Tennes and Three, }> 

he quoted the doggerel verse. 

We looked at him mutely. 

“ It is a tiresome truism,” he went on, reflec- 
tively, “ that what lies close to the eye often 
escapes observation. For instance, these win- 
dows have been staring at me daily, each with 
its nice little eyebrow of design, and I overlooked 
the design until my subconscious mind suggested 
to me that here, in all probability, lies Hellen’s 
Keye.” 

I remembered the entry in Freeman’s diary, 
concerning the loss of a “ Keye,” which had n’t 
been found among his father’s papers, and of a 
secret which had died with the older man. 

“ I think I told you,” said The Author, “ that 
this house was built by master masons, shortly 
after the Grand Lodge was established in Lon- 
don. Thirty-three is rather a significant num- 
ber. Yet, how to apply it,” he paused, frowning. 


FIRES OF YESTERDAY 245 

“ Without disturbing a Watcher in the Dark? ” 
Alicia made light of The Author's itch for 
mystery. u Are n't you rather forgetting the 
Watcher in the Dark? Teller of tales, is n’t it 
moon-stuff you ’re trying to spin? ” 

“ Who talks of a Watcher in the Dark? ” asked 
a pleasant voice. Accompanied by Mr. Johnson, 
Mr. Nicholas Jelnik had strolled up unperceived. 

“ The Author,” Alicia explained, mischiev- 
ously, “ is trying to make sense out of nonsense.” 

“ That,” said Mr. Jelnik, smiling, “ is not an 
uncommon occupation.” 

“ It ’ s all about a bit of doggerel we found on 
a scrap of paper in the attic,” I told him. And 
I quoted it, adding : “ There was a column of 

dots under it. The Author laments that he lost 
it, before he had chance to unravel it.” 

“ I lost it, walking in my sleep,” said The Au- 
thor, disagreeably. 

“ And now he ’s trying to make us believe that 
the design in the brick-work above our windows, 
just because it ’s the Greek fret, is Hellenes Keye,” 
Alicia said, jestingly. 

“Well, you know, if a thing means anything , 
it ’s got to mean something,” put in Mr. Johnson. 

“Ain’t it the truth, though?” hissed The Au- 
thor, with fury. 

Mr. Johnson was saved from stammering ex- 
planations by the irruption of Beautiful Dog, 


246 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


who at sound of his voice had wriggled, and 
cringed, and fawned his way out of the shrubbery, 
cocking a wary eye to see that none of the Black 
family was around. Beautiful Dog rolled his 
eyes at his god, swung his tail, waggled his ears, 
made uncouth movements with his splay feet, 
and grinned from ear to ear. He was so utterly 
absurd that he claimed everybody’s amused at- 
tention. 

“ Why, old chap ! You ’re rather glad to see 
your friends, are n’t you? ” the secretary said in 
his pleasant voice. 

Beautiful Dog yelped with rapture, darted 
back into the shrubbery, and a moment later 
emerged and laid at his adored one’s feet all his 
treasure, a chewed slipper. He tried to say that 
precious as this gift undoubtedly was, he gave it 
willingly, joyfully. But scenting other white 
people too near, he backed off, and fled. 

The Author’s eyes followed him. 

“ I wonder if I ’d have been equal to that, my- 
self, if I ’d been born a nigger dog with an in- 
grained distrust of the white man?” he ques- 
tioned. “ Gad ! it comes near being the real 
thing, Johnson!” 

The secretary looked at the slipper lying at his 
feet: “I wonder wdiere he found that, now?” 

I was wondering the same thing, and so was 
Alicia. 


FIRES OF YESTERDAY 


247 


“ Let ’s show Beautiful Dog the Chinese po- 
liteness of being decent enough not to accept his 
gift when he ’s decent enough to offer it,” she 
suggested. 

“ Yes, throw it into the shrubbery and let him 
find it. That may raise white people somewhat 
in his estimation,” I added, hastily. 

Instantly Mr. Jelnik picked it up and tossed 
it among the bushes. His action seemed the 
merest polite compliance with my request, and 
he barely glanced at the object he cast away. 
Yet it was really worth a second glance. 
Chewed, frayed, and torn, it had once been of 
finest red Morocco leather; and it was such a flat 
and heelless slipper as no native Hyndsville foot 
had ever warn. It was The Jinnee’s slipper. 


CHAPTER XIV 


THE TALISMAN 

M RS. CHESHIRE SCARBORO was far 
from the fool her cousin Sophronisba had 
credited her with being. She had sufficient 
cleverness to understand that Hyndsville was n’t 
big enough to hold two factions. For a faction 
was forming with Hynds House as its storm-cen- 
ter, and it was one which threatened Mrs. 
Scarboro’s hitherto unquestioned sovereignty. 
Jimmy Scarboro himself, a most personable 
youth, was one of the ringleaders of revolt. 

A weaker woman would have kept up the fight. 
Mrs. Scarboro understood that to spend one’s 
powers trying to hold an untenable position is a 
proof not of valor but of stupidity. She quietly 
declared a truce, sending out, in the form of an 
invitation to one of her sacred card-parties, ten- 
tative notice that she would consider joining 
forces. We recognized the olive-brai ch, seri- 
ously extended. The next move was ours. 

“ There ’s a time to fight, and a time to leave 
off fighting,” Alicia decided. “ Here ’s where we 
disarm. When these people come from under the 
248 


THE TALISMAN 


249 


shade of the dear old family tree, they ’re quite 
human. We have got to let them give themselves 
the opportunity to discover that we’re human, 
too.” 

It was n’t necessary to explain things to The 
Author, because a portion of his brain is purely 
and cattily feminine. That ’s why he is a genius. 
No man is a genius whose brain is n’t bisexual. 

“ I shall have to lay aside a cherished prejudice 
and lend this lady the light of my countenance, 
although I loathe card-parties. I abhor cards, 
outside of draw-poker on shipboard, with a crook 
of sorts sitting in to lend the game a fillip. De- 
spite the fact that poor Mrs. Scarboro could n’t 
lay hands on a decent crook to save her life, I 
think I shall go, and thereby acquire merit,” he 
concluded, with the air of a martyr. 

I looked at him gratefully. 

“ I ’ll wager that little Sophy thinks she wants 
to go because she desires to be friends and neigh- 
bors. i Behold how good and how pleasant it is 
for brethren to dwell together in unity ! ’ — 
You ’re a transparent person, you Sophy! ” 

“ But I do desire to be friends with them. I 
have to live here all the rest of my life, have n’t 
I? ” 

“ Not necessarily,” replied The Author, arch- 
ing his eyebrows. “ For instance, you can live 
in New York any time you w 7 ant to, Sophy.” 


250 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


“ I ’ve never told- yon that you might call me 
Sophy,” I parried, hastily. 

“ Oh, but I like to call you Sophy,” he re- 
sponded airily. “ And really, you should n’t 
mind. I ’ve called people lots worse things than 
Sophy, in my time ! But then,” he added, “ I 
did n’t happen to like them. As for you, I find 
you a very likeable being, Sophy ; upon my word, 
extremely likeable ! ” 

“ Thank you,” said I. I was n’t anxious to 
hear The Author tell me how likable he found me ; 
at least, not yet. 

For pride’s sake as well as for the sake of cus- 
tom — and in South Carolina custom has all 
the power of a fetish — Mrs. Scarboro would have 
died rather than vary by one jot or tittle her 
usual refreshments, or wear a new frock, on that 
particular night. Yet the occasion, despite its 
mild diversions, was distinctly epochal, in that it 
marked the reunion of Hvndsville. Even Mr. 
Nicholas Jelnik, for the first time, put in his 
decorative appearance, to The Author's fidgety 
surprise. He played a highly creditable game 
of bridge. And after a while he sang “ Believe 
Me if All Those Endearing Young Charms,” so 
exquisitely that a hushed and rapturous silence 
fell upon everybody, and the old ladies and gen- 


THE TALISMAN 


251 


tlemen present held their hands before misty 
eyes. They used to sing that song when the old 
men were boy soldiers marching off to the tune 
of “ The Bonnie Blue Flag,” and the old ladies 
were ringleted girls in hoop-skirts bidding them 
good-by. 

“ My dear boy/’ Mrs. Scarboro told him, with 
great feeling, “you have been fdrgetting that 
you ’re a cousin of mine. Your mother and I 
were girls together. I want you to meet some 
other old friends of hers and your grandfather’s,” 
and she carried him off to a group of those won- 
derful old ladies who grow to purest perfection in 
South Carolina — low-voiced lovely old ladies, 
dressed in black silk, with cameo brooches at 
their throats, and lace caps on their white hair. 

A little group of old gentlemen immediately 
foregathered with them. They knew who was 
and was n’t kin to Sally Hynds’s son, unto the 
seventh generation. 

“ They ’ve begun on the begats,” chuckled The 
Author, “ First Book of Chronicles, Chapters One 
to Four.” 

“ Jelnik ’s really kin to them, and he ought to 
pay for the privilege,” said Mr. Johnson. 

The Author looked at the old ladies, on whose 
delicate withered hands the wedding-rings hung 
loosely, and at the erect old gentlemen with white 


252 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


goatees, and something whimsically tender came 
into his clever face. 

“ It is worth the price/' he said, very gently — 
for him. 

“Now, that was your soul speaking ! ” said 
Miss Emmeline, warmly. Instantly The Author 
wrinkled his nose, bristled his mustache, and 
looked like a hyena. Miss Martha Hopkins, wor- 
shipfully observant of the great man, caught his 
eye at that moment and thought he was scowling 
at her. She looked so stricken that Tlie Author 
presently strolled over and sat down beside her, 
to her fluttering delight. But discovering that 
she was wholly unacquainted with the original 
verse of J. Gordon Coogler of Columbia, he first 
bitterly reproached her for neglecting home-made 
talent, and then proceeded to make sure that she 
would remember the Bard of the Congaree so 
long as she lived. 

“ Not know Coogler ! ” cried The Author, 
shrilly ; “ ignorant of the bard raised, so to speak, 
around your own door-step? Horrible! Listen 
to this ! ” said he, accusingly : 

“ Fair lady, on that snowy neck and half-clad bosom 
Which you so publicly reveal to man, 

There ; s not a single outward stain or speck. 

Would that you had given but half the care 
To the training of your intellect and heart, 

As you have given to that spotless neck ! ” 


THE TALISMAN 


253 


“ Gracious Heavens ! ” gasped Miss Martha, 
who showed a modest salt-cellar in the mildest of 
Vs. 

“ Is it possible you don’t like him? ” demanded 
The Author, amazedly. “ But, my dear woman ! 
Coogler ’s — why, Coogler ’s ginger-pop to a 
thirsty world ! ” 

“I — I don’t drink ginger-pop ! ” confessed the 
be-deviled Center of Culture, foggily. 

“ Alas ! for the South, her books have grown fewer, 

She never was much given to literature/’ 

quoted The Author, pensively. 

She was speechless. The shameless Author, 
fixing upon her a last long, lingering look of 
sorrowful reproach, said with emotion : 

“ From early youth to the frost of age 
Man’s days have been a mixture 
Of all that constitutes in life 
A dark and gloomy picture.” 

And he stalked off, leaving Miss Martha Hop- 
kins in a state of mind. 

“ Friend Author,” Alicia murmured, as he 
paused beside her, “ I wish you were my own 
dear little boy for just five merry minutes. I ’d 
show you,” she declared, divided between Irish 
mirth and human pity for Miss Martha, “ I ’d 
show you what a hair-brush could accomplish ! ” 


254 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


“ Too late!” regretted The Author, shaking 
his head. “ But,” he suggested, brightening, 
“ could n’t you wish to be my own dear little girl, 
instead? ” 

“ This is so sudden ! ” murmured Alicia, coyly. 

“ Deluding devilette ! ” breathed The Author, 
“ get thee behind me ! ” 

That evening was the first time I had ever heard 
myself called “ pretty.” I was used to “ business- 
like ” and “ efficient ” and “ trustworthy ” — all 
excellent terms, in their way, but not such happy 
things, any one of them, as “ pretty.” 

“ What are you thinking of, Sophy? ” asked 
The Author. “ Something over the hills and far 
away? Because you look as Maude Adams used 
to look when she first played 6 Peter Pan.’ ” 

I hoped it might be true, because — 

I looked up then and met Mr. Nicholas Jelnik’s 
dark eyes. They were falcon eyes, but now there 
was something in them that made me, to my rage 
and confusion and chagrin, blush like a silly 
school-girl. When I again ventured to glance 
in his direction he was patiently and politely lis- 
tening to a white-goateed, game-legged U. C. V. 
refight the Civil War with so fiery a zest that he 
presently caught another veteran a resounding 
crack on the funny-bone with the gold-headed 
stick he was flourishing. Both gentlemen half 


THE TALISMAN 255 

rose, the one making wry faces and rubbing his 
elbow, the other bowing and apologetic. 

“ Pahdon me, Majah ! My deah suh, pahdon 
me! But I was just tellin’ this boy about the 
day in the Wilderness his grandfathah Hynds 
took a Yankee bullet out of my leg with a paih 
of silvah scissahs and bandaged it with the tail 
of his shirt. 

“ i I ’ve lost my niggah and my instruments, 
Sam/ says the doctah, ‘ but that ’s no reason why 
the damyankees should have the satisfaction of 
killin’ a puffeckly good rebel, when there ’s not 
enough to go around now. Hold your leg still/ 
says he, rollin’ up his sleeves, ‘ an’ with the help 
of God and my scissahs and my shirt-tail, I ’ll 
save it for you.’ An’ he did. I walked home 
from Appomattox on that same leg, suh,” said 
the veteran, and brought his stick down on the 
toes of it with a force that made him utter a 
muffled bellow. 

The other, still nursing an outraged elbow, 
smiled sweetly. 

“ Thanks, Sam,” he drawled. 

The Author chuckled appreciatively. “ And 
to think we Americans rush abroad, when the 
republic of South Carolina is right next-door to 
us ! ” he murmured. 

A gentle change was creeping over Hynds 


256 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


House, perhaps because of the delightful old 
ladies who had begun to come there. Old gen- 
tlemen, too, formed the pleasant habit of drop- 
ping in, beguiled by the artful Author, waited 
upon son-like by his secretary, foregathered with 
as kith and kin by the Englishman, mint-juleped 
by the three of them, enchanted by Alicia, and 
teaed and caked and beloved by me. Even our 
cats adored them. The Black family could spot 
a Confederate Veteran as far off as the front gate, 
and would rush wildly to meet him, rubbing and 
roaching and purring in and out of his old legs. 
The Author insisted that their passion for U. C. 
V.’s was an inherited trait with our cats, and 
that we ourselves were merely acquired charac- 
teristics. 

In April, just before Miss Emmeline was to 
return to Boston, and the Englishman and his 
daughter were to go back home, Alicia and I de- 
cided to give a farewell dance. It was to be in 
costume. 

Hyndsville was pleasantly excited. Never had 
there been such rummaging of attics, such search- 
ings of old trunks! We rummaged our attic, 
too. I selected a yellow brocade trimmed with 
seed-pearls and cascades of lace, and Alicia chose 
a skimpy blue satin frock with a round neck, an 
upstanding lace collar, and absurd little puffed 
sleeves. The Englishman was a Puritan, his 


THE TALISMAN 


257 


daughter a Quakeress, Mr. Johnson a Huguenot 
Lover, Miss Emmeline a Colonial Lady, Doctor 
Geddes a bearded and belted Boyar, and The 
Author a painfully realistic Mephistopheles, his 
eyebrows corked upward and his mustache waxed 
into points. Mr. Jelnik sent regrets. 

We had waxed the floors, and moved most of 
the furniture out of the big front drawing-room ; 
and this and the wide halls were used for a ball- 
room, just as they had been used in the old days. 
The older people played cards in the living-room 
and library. Every now and then, between 
pauses, some masked and brilliant figure, like a 
bright ghost from the past, would steal in to look 
over their shoulders and whisper in their ears. 

But those grandparents weren’t content to 
sit down and play cards while others footed it. 
Not they ! They danced the Lancers, and a polka 
or two, and waltzed and dipped and bowed to 
“ Cornin’ through the Rye ” while all the masquer- 
aders lined up against the walls to admire and 
applaud. And after the gayest sort of a buffet 
supper, the prizes that had been won by a belle 
and a trooper of ’61 — she in her grandmother’s 
crinoline and he in his grandfather’s gray jacket 
— were turned over by acclaim to a sprightly 
lady of seventy and her sprightlier partner of 
seventy-five, for coming disguised as old folks. 
The Author made the presentation speech" He 


258 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


began it by saying that in South Carolina any 
man might well be excused for falling in love with 
his grandmother. 

Then the oldsters began to depart, with laugh- 
ter and gay good nights. It had been a delight- 
ful affair, one of those affairs that go with a 
swing and a rhythm all their own, and that one 
remembers with a pleasant taste in the mouth. 

Only the more indefatigable youngsters re- 
mained. They had n’t the slightest intention of 
foregoing half a night’s dancing. They danced 
in the hall to the music of the victrola, while the 
regular musicians were being feted in the kitchen 
by Mary Magdalen, Queenasheeba, and Fernolia. 

I missed my fan, and went into the drawing- 
room to look for it. The room was quite empty 
for the moment, and looked lonesome for all its 
blazing lights. A cool, sweet night wind came 
in through the open windows, refreshingly. 
And quite suddenly there was framed in one of 
them a figure more exotic, more bizarre, than any 
of our maskers had been. 

His dark robe was folded over his breast, and 
the silver shaft of a knife showed in his red 
girdle. His white wool stuck out from under 
his red fez, and his ear-rings gleamed against his 
black cheeks, and the bracelets on his wiry arms 
made a faint tinkling as he leaned forward. Em- 


THE TALISMAN 


259 


boldened by his twinkling eyes, his crooked, 
friendly smile, eager to question him, I drew 
nearer. He stretched out his hand, and slipped 
into mine the half of a broken coin. 


CHAPTER XV 


THE HEART OF HYNDS HOUSE 

1 STOOD staring at the broken coin in my hand 
with a sort of stupefaction, while The Jin- 
nee moved slowly away from the window. I had 
received a summons I could not ignore. Had I 
not promised, smilingly indeed, but sincerely, to 
answer that call whenever and however it should 
come? 

The music had ceased for the moment, and the 
big hall was quite empty, for the dancers had 
trooped into the dining-room, from which came 
laughter and chattering voices, and the chink of 
silver and china. The great front doors were 
wide open. I slipped unseen into the darkly 
bright, whispering night. 

The moon was high in the heavens, for it was 
past midnight ; the wind was chill upon my shoul- 
ders, the dew silvery under my feet. There w r as 
an odor abroad — the ineffable odor of sleepily 
stirring spring, of young new leaves budding, of 
tender grass, growing like a baby’s hair. 

At some distance ahead I could just distinguish 
the dark figure of the messenger, flitting sound- 
260 


THE HEART OF HYNDS HOUSE 261 


less as a shadow. And then, to my infinite relief, 
out of the shrubbery stepped Boris, and thrust 
his doggy nose into my hand. I laid hold of his 
collar, and he trotted sedately beside me. 

I had half expected to be led to the gray-gabled 
cottage^ but The Jinnee stole along in the shadow 
of the hedge, stopped beside the spring-house, and 
held up his hand. 

“ In the name of God ! ” said I, involuntarily. 

“ The compassionate, the merciful ! ” finished 
The Jinnee, and turning to the east made a pro- 
found reverence. There was something so sim- 
ple and so sincere in his manner that my momen- 
tary fear subsided. 

“But why have I been sent for? Why are 
you here? ” I wondered. 

He folded his arms upon his breast, and in a 
sing-song voice, curiously unlike any other I had 
ever heard, answered parrotlike : 

“ This is the word of the master : Take to the 
fair-haired lady the broken coin, my sign, and 
she will remember her word to me. Verily, for 
the sign’s sake, she will follow without fear.” 

“ The master is not ill, then? ” 

“ In his body he is well. But of the spirit of 
man, and what help he needs, there is but one 
judge, namely, God.” 

“ He has need of me? ” 

“He sends the token by me, Achmet.” And 


262 A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 

he stood there with a motionless patience, wait- 
ing. 

Achmet! I remembered an afternoon in the 
Enchanted Wood, and that name ringing in my 
ears — Achmet ! 

“ I will follow you,” I said. And instantly 
The Jinnee pushed open the unlocked door of the 
spring-house and stepped inside. 

I hesitated for a moment, turning my head to- 
ward Hynds House, blazing with lights. I could 
hear voices, laughter, snatches of song. From 
the kitchen Mary Magdalen’s great, rich, unctu- 
ous laugh rolled out like an organ peal. Sil- 
houetted against the lighted library window T was 
one of our big black cats, with an arched back 
and an uplifted and expressive tail. 

“ I wait,” said a quiet voice. And, clutching 
Boris by the collar, I stepped inside the door. 

It was dark in there; only a faint and broken 
light came through the one window, set high in 
the wall. Boris 's eyes were balls of fire, and 
his feet made a stealthy, scuffling sound on the 
flagged floor. The little spring bubbling in its 
stone basin was like a whispering, secretive voice. 

Achmet stooped down, over in one corner. 
Then, shading a very modern flash-light with a 
fold of his robe, he showed me one of the square 
flags lifted, and a black hole yawning in the 
floor. 


THE HEART OF HYNDS HOUSE 263 


I backed away. With a crooked, sly smile, The 
Jinnee snapped his fingers at Boris. The big dog 
jerked himself free of my hand and disappeared. 

“ Now ! ” said The Jinnee. And like one in a 
dream I gathered my lace-trimmed skirts in my 
hand and backed down a spider-web stairway that 
barely gave one foothold. Achmet waited until 
I reached the bottom, then he, too, backed in, and 
I heard the flagstone fall to over my head. 

There was a moment of utter and awful black- 
ness and stillness. I was upon the point of 
shrieking, when something cold and friendly 
touched my hand: Boris was nosing me. The 
Jinnee, at the bottom of the steps, showed the 
light. 

We were in a circular shaft, narrowing upward 
like an inverted funnel. It was quite clean and 
dry, lined with hard cement. Branching from 
it were two wedge-shaped openings, just wide 
enough to allow one person at a time to walk 
through. 

The Jinnee plunged into one of these, and Boris 
and I followed. There was nothing else for us 
to do. 

“ This is safest way. If I come through house, 
I am seen. Not want that,” said Achmet, over 
his shoulder. 

I made no reply. I was wondering what The 
Author would have said had he seen us at that 

f 


264 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


moment — The Jinnee shuffling ahead in heel- 
less slippers and Oriental dress, upon his woolly 
head a red fez with a silver crescent on it, and 
on his breast a string of saphies, verses from the 
Koran, in exquisite Arabic script, framed in flat 
round pieces of silver and strung on a chain. 
Boris, larger and nobler even than most of his 
breed, paced behind him. Then came I, a slim 
blonde woman, with fair hair powdered, in a 
dress a century old. 

The passage was n’t quite six feet high, and so 
still that you could hear the beating of your 
heart. Achmet’s slippers went scuf-scuf-scuf. 
Boris swayed from side to side, his tongue lolling, 
his eyes phosphorescent. He resembled those 
ghost-hounds of old stories, terrific beasts that 
follow the Wild Huntsman. 

We went down some steps. I should n’t have 
been surprised had I found myself climbing the 
beanstalk after Jack. Dazedly I thought : “ I ’ll 
wake up in the morning and tell them at the 
breakfast-table what a wonderful dream I had.” 
I could fancy the Lady with the Soul clasping her 
hands, and The Author crinkling his eyes, and 
Alicia laughing. 

This last passage, which, I learned afterward, 
ran under the carriage house, presently crooked 
like an elbow and led us into a windowless and 
stone-floored little room, under the cellar. On 


THE HEART OF HYNDS HOUSE 265 


the opposite side of the room was the opening of 
another such passage, with stone steps leading to 
it. On these steps sat Nicholas Jelnik. 

He got to his feet and stood looking at me. A 
momentary red rushed to his cheek, and his eyes 
flashed. Boris, tongue out, tail wagging, rubbed 
against him, and the master’s hand dropped be- 
tween the speaking eyes with a swift caress. 

“Good dog! You came with her!” 

“ And I. Am I not also a good dog? ” asked 
The Jinnee, jealously. 

Mr. Jelnik’s reply I did not understand, but 
Achmet made a respectful salutation, and his 
grin was the grin of a little boy. 

“ Sophy! ” said Nicholas Jelnik, and his voice 
shook, “ Sophy! Oh, I knew you would come! ” 
He gave a low, pleased laugh. “ And now she is 
here, she does n’t even ask why I have sent for 
her!” 

“The mistress,” said Achmet, “should have 
been of the Faith. May Allah enlighten her!” 

“ Sit down here beside me for a few minutes, 
Sophy, and rest,” said Mr. Jelnik, seating him- 
self. “ And do not look so pale, my little com- 
rade.” 

“ I thought — that you might be ill,” I faltered. 
“ I thought — that you needed me.” 

“I am not ill, but I do need you,” he said 
quickly, and took my hand in a firm clasp. The 


266 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


touch of that hand brought me out of my trance- 
like state. It was all right, and the most natural 
thing in the world, that I should be sitting in this 
windowless vault, with two candles and a shad- 
owy lantern burning dimly in the still air, an 
old black Jinnee squatting on his heels watching 
me, a great wolf-hound stretched beside him. 
Wasn’t Nicholas Jelnik holding my hand? 

“ Sophy, 1 ” he said directly, “ I have found the 
lost Key of Hynds House.’’ I looked at him 
dumbly. “ I have reached that point where I 
can tell you everything, little friend. Thank 
Heaven you have come ! ” But of a sudden his 
forehead was damp. 

“ You will remember,” he said, after a mo- 
ment’s silence, and still holding my hand — and 
I think that now he held it as he had once held his 
mother’s — “ when I talked to you about my child- 
hood and my mother, I told you she had made me 
more of an American than an Austrian. This old 
home-town of her people, this old house, the mys- 
tery that blackened the Hynds name, were as real 
to me as the scenes and people that actually sur- 
rounded me. 

“ When I was older, she turned over to me all 
her family papers, and I sifted and assorted and 
reduced them to system and order. I found 
among them Richard Hynds’s own brief account 
of the affair, and copies of letters to his father, 


THE HEART OF HYNDS HOUSE 267 


but the bulk of the papers consisted of such data 
as his son and namesake could gather. This 
formed a copious mass, for he had set down every 
least circumstance that he thought might have 
any bearing upon his father’s case. These 
papers, guarded so jealously, bequeathed to his 
successors the sacred task of righting Richard 
Hynds. 

“ In Richard's short statement, left for his lit- 
tle son, he, as rightful heir of Hynds House, men- 
tions the secret passages and tells how they maj 
be entered. He had been taught that much, him- 
self, on reaching his majority. But there was 
one vital secret that had n’t been revealed to 
Richard, for not until the head of Hynds House 
knew T he was about to die did he give to his suc- 
cessor the Key to the hidden room ; the room con- 
cealed so cunningly that without the Key one 
could never hope to find it. They planned and 
built wonderfully well, those old master work* 
men. They meant that secret room to be the 
strong-box, the inviolate hiding-place which 
should keep wdiat might be entrusted to it. It 
was, as it were, the heart of Hynds House. 

“ Remember that Richard’s father died of a 
stroke of apoplexy, and without speaking. Thus 
Freeman would know no more than Richard did. 
There was but one person alive who knew, and 
that was — ” 


268 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


“A slave? ” I whispered, remembering Free- 
man’s diary. 

“ A slave, an unlettered slave. How he discov- 
ered it I do not know. But he did discover it. 
He knew, and the Hyndses did not. In regard 
to this same slave, a curious item was set down 
by Bichard’s son: 

“ ‘ This day Black Shooba’s son told me of a 
heathen song Shooba made before he died and 
swore him to forget not. ’T is a strange chaunt : 

“ I, Shooba, the Snake Soul, make me a Song. 

In the night I sing it for my Snake. 

My Snake showed me a Secret Thing. 

Two Eyes and Two Eyes looked upon One Eye. 

One Eye is open and sees, and sees not. 

This my Snake showed me, in the Dark. 

But the Strong Ones, the White Ones, 

They have no Snake. Ho ! Never shall they see it ! ” 

“ Sounds like a stark raving, does n’t it? One 
can fancy the doctor feeling a bit ashamed of 
himself when he wrote it down. 

“ I rather fancied it raving, myself, until one 
day I came across — here he paused, and looked 
at me intently — “ a yellowed slip of paper be- 
tween the pages of an old diary that had been ac- 
cidentally discovered. I knew then that there 
was really something to be discovered, and that 
I had not been a visionary sentimentalist when I 


THE HEART OF HYNDS HOUSE 269 


yielded to my mother’s last expressed wish that 
I should come here and search. 

“ I suppose,” he went on dreamily, “ that it 
was in my blood, the desire to come here to 
Hyndsville, like a homing bird. But when my 
mother died, the ties that bound me to her 
country seemed to be in a measure loosened. 
Then, too, the Wanderlust had me in its grip. I 
put aside the profession my father had bred me 
to, left my affairs in what I thought capable 
hands, and indulged my desire to w T ander up and 
down the earth and sail the seven seas. It was 
upon one of these prowls that I came upon my old 
Achmet here, and induced a master who did n’t 
love him to part with him.” And he looked at 
the old man with whimsical tenderness. 

“ I am your slave,” spoke up The Jinnee, 
sturdily. “ I am the fostered offspring of my 
master’s bounty. May he live a thousand 
years ! ” 

That shocked my Yankee ears. Achmet smiled 
his crooked smile. 

“ Why did the sahiba follow when I showed her 
a broken coin? ” he asked. 

“ Because I knew that Mr. Jelnik needed me.” 

“Even in the bowels of the earth?” I was 
silent. 

“ Because he is the master! ” said The Jinnee. 
“ Therefore you obeyed. He is the master. 


270 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


Wherefore am I, Achmet, his slave.” Oh, shame 
upon you, Sophy Smith, for there was that in 
you, and that not the least divine part, which 
was in full accord with black Achmet ! 

“ Achmet’s ideas are of the immutable East,” 
said Mr. Jelnik, with a faint smile. “ He is 
archaic.” And dismissing this persiflage with a 
wave of the hand, he continued : 

“ Behold me, then, footing it up and down the 
highways and byways of the world. But it was 
as if I had disobeyed the dead, and they would 
give me no rest. So presently I stopped short 
and came to Hyndsville. 

“With Richard's directions in my possession, 
it was comparatively easy for me to find the pas- 
sageways, and after the old woman’s death I had 
chance to examine the house room by room. And 
sometimes, Sophy, when I have been alone in this 
tragic old place — ” he paused, and looked at me 
with a puzzled frown — “ it has seemed to me that 
there were — well, secret influences, say ; things 
outside of our sphere. I have felt a sense of hor- 
ror and despair descend upon my spirit, a weight 
almost too heavy to bear. Sometimes it would 
be so powerful, so insistent, so vivid, that I had 
to fly from it. 

“ Then I happened to remember something that 
a gipsy, an old, old man reputed to be very wise, 
told me when I was a boy. He said that trou- 


THE HEART OF HYNDS HOUSE 271 


bled spirits can be soothed and sent hence by 
music. It is the old and sure charm, as David 
found when he played upon the harp and drove 
the evil spirit out of Saul the king. I brought 
my violin and tried it. And/’ said the cosmo- 
politan Mr. Jelnik, “ the gipsy was right.” 

“ Ah, yes, I see you know, now. It was I whom 
you heard playing, that first day. It was I, 
touched by your plight in that forlorn and dusty 
barracks, Avho gave you some slight relief. It 
was easy enough for me to cut across to Geddes’s 
house, reach in through his kitchen window, lift 
his tray, and escape through the ragged hedges 
while his cook’s broad back was turned. Achmet 
was willing enough to play the obliging Jinnee. 
You had your dinner, and I had a bit of harmless 
amusement. It pleased me to hear Alicia call me 
Ariel. It pleased me to stand by, to protect you, 
if that should be necessary. Achmet and I took 
turns in safeguarding you at night. 

“You will understand” — he gave me a 
straight, clear, proud look — “ that it was never 
my desire to mystify or to frighten you. But I 
could n’t take you offhand into my confidence, 
could I? I had to find out something more about 
you. Remember, too, that my search in no wise 
jeopardizes your interests. 

“ Day after day, night after night, Sophy, I 
have pored over old papers, or burrowed mole- 


272 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


like into the black recesses of Hynds House. 
Bit by bit I have pieced scraps of evidence to- 
gether — Shooba’s savage chant with Seipio’s 
dying whisper in Freeman’s ear, and these two 
with a rude verse and a line of dots. But there 
the thread snapped. 

“ Do you remember the morning you told me, 
The Author’s guess that 4 Hellen’s Keye ’ was 
the Greek fret, the design over all the windows 
and doors of Hynds House? The trail was 
plain then. I was to follow the line of the Greek 
key for three and thirty turnings, when I should 
come upon a sign. I tried and tried. And to- 
night — I reached the end of it, Sophy. I found 
it.” Again his forehead was damp, and his pal- 
lor, if possible, deepened. 

I rose as if on springs. The hair of my head 
rose, too, I thought, and my scalp tingled. 

“ Found what? ” 

“ The hidden room that the masters built for 
the master of Hynds House.” He stopped, and 
a shudder passed over him. His hand closed 
upon mine, and it was deathly cold.” 

“ You have been in a secret room? — here in 
Hynds House?” I asked incredulously. 

“ Yes,” said he in a whisper. “ I opened the 
door — and went in. The room hadn’t been 
opened for a hundred years, Sophy. There was 
a table in one corner, and I went over to it. 


THE HEART OF HYNDS HOUSE 273 


There was something else there, too, Sophy.” He 
moistened his lips, and looked at me with dilated 
eyes. 

“What?” I asked; “in God's name, what?” 
“ The thief,” said Nicholas Jelnik. 


CHAPTER XVI 


THE DEVILL HIS RAINBOW 

1 WAS taken with a cold grue. 

“ Is it — murder? ” It seemed to me that 
the still room shook and echoed to the barely 
whispered word, that the candles stirred and 
flickered as in a wind of passing wings. 

“ Not in the sense you mean,” he replied. “ But 
whatever it may be, Sophy, this thing has got to 
be met and faced by us two together. It con- 
cerns you now, as well as me.” He stood up as 
he spoke. “ And now,” he asked, u are you 
strong enough to come with me? ” 

I gathered the living spirit within me and 
looked him in his eyes. ^ 

“ Yes,” I said steadily. 

“ Allah ! but here is a woman a man may serve 
without shame to his beard ! ” quoth The Jinnee, 
wagging his old white head. And with Boris 
stretched beside him he resigned himself to wait 
with the tireless patience of the East. 

If the other passages had been narrow, that 
which we now entered was worse. It was so 

274 


THE DEVILL HIS RAINBOW 275 


narrow that the wall on each side seemed about 
to close in and crush us, like those frightful slid- 
ing walls that became a living coffin for the vic- 
tims of medieval cruelty. Always one was con- 
fronted by solid brick walls, and to turn back 
was to meet others seemingly risen to cut off all 
escape. For this passage follows the simple and 
yet intricate pattern of the Greek key. Thus: 



I fancied myself doomed to spend a frightful 
eternity of burroAving through brick wormholes 
which led nowhere. I lost all sense of location, 
time, and direction. I wasn’t even sure of 
my own identity any more: things like this 
could n’t happen to a woman named Smith ! 
Just when I reached the stage where I was ready 
to drop down and lie there unmoving until I died, 
he turned his head and gave me a comradely 


276 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


smile of assurance and trust. I plucked up heart 
of grace and staggered on. Of a sudden he 
stopped. The pale circle of the flash-light moved 
up, inch by inch, steadied, and stayed on one spot. 

I found myself staring fixedly at the old and 
familiar enough symbol of the rayed eye within 
the triangle. It was not commonplace or fa- 
miliar set up there in that secret and awesome 
place and seen by a pale light. There was about 
it a stark and stern solemnity, such as suggested 
the winged circle of immortality carved above the 
rock-hewn doors of the tombs of Egyptian kings. 
Higher than a tall man’s head, it was painted on 
bricks of a lighter hue than the surrounding ones, 
and when the light touched it it seemed to leap 
out of the dark like a thing alive, a thing that 
watched with an unwinking and terrifying im 
tensity. 

I remembered Shooba’s savage chant of the One 
Eye that his Snake had shown him ; and the dog- 
gerel verse on the frayed paper in Freeman’s 
diary. 

“ The Watcher in the Dark ! ” I stammered ; 
“the Watcher in the Dark! Why — why, that 
paper was the Key itself ! ” 

“ Exactly. And a very simple key, though it 
took me a heartbreaking length of time to turn 
it. The cipher was easy enough. It falls apart 
into the figures three, five, seven, and nine ; it was 


THE DEVILL HIS RAINBOW 277 

also the simplest train of reasoning to apply these 
figures to the column of dots. Only, I hadn’t 
the remotest idea what the dots themselves rep- 
resented. Nor did it occur to me that the tortu- 
ous turnings of any of the passageways of Hynds 
House might follow the pattern of the Greek key, 
until The Author called your attention to the de- 
sign over the outside windows. Clever man, The 
Author ! 

“ I lost the paper in the attic the night you 
heard me stumble on the stairs. Fortunately, 
The Author put it in his coat in the closet and 
locked the door on the outside. You can enter 
any room in the Hynds House through those 
closet-walls, Sophy. They ’re paneled, remem- 
ber. I hated to have to go through The Author’s 
pockets like a burglar, but I had to have the key.” 

He handed me the flash-light. 

“ Now for the column of dots, each of which 
represents a brick,” he said, and began to count, 
from the first dark brick immediately under 
the center of the triangle. At the third brick 
he paused; I could see his fingers moving 
around the white line that, apparently, held 
it in place. And that third brick, which looked 
so solidly placed, turned as upon a pivot and 
swung out sideways. Still counting from top 
to bottom, he paused at the fifth, the seventh, 
and the ninth, and they, too, behaved in the same 


278 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


manner. As the ninth one turned, that which 
had seemed a section of solid wall rose sound- 
lessly from the floor and left in its place an open- 
ing, a door, as it were, some six feet hi^h and 
about eighteen inches wide. 

“ It is not brick at all, hut painted wood. A 
really wonderful bit of work,” explained Mr. Jeb 
nik. 

I could only stare, owlishly. 

“ You are wondering where we are? ” He an- 
swered the unspoken question: “ Above the li- 
brary, between the outside wall and the chimney- 
stacks. You ’d have to tear the house down to 
find it, without the Key.” As he spoke, he was 
lighting two of the candles Achmet had provided 
us with, and although his hand w r as quite steady, 
he had become frightfully pale. I, too, felt my- 
self growing paler, felt again the cold grue, as 
if the wind of death had stirred my hair. 

“ Keach into my breast pocket and you ’ll find 
a small vial. Put a drop of the contents on your 
handkerchief and hold it against your mouth 
for a moment,” said Mr. Jelnik, with a sharp 
glance at me. 

I obeyed mechanically. The scent had an in- 
describably tingling, spicy odor, and left a cool 
and grateful sensation in one’s parched and dry 
throat. My blurred vision cleared, my dull and 
throbbing head was relieved. 


THE DEVILL HIS RAINBOW 279 


“ And Alexandrine Copt gave me that/’ he said, 
watching its effect with satisfaction. “ He told 
me he had gotten it from a temple papyrus, and 
that it was undoubtedly one of the lost perfumes 
of Punt, used by the higher priesthood in their 
mysteries. Once a year he sends me such a tiny 
vial as you see. I could hardly have survived 
my searchings in this house, without that saving 
perfume. Do you feel able to go on? ” 

“ Yes.” 

“ Come, then,” and with that he stepped 
through the opening, and I after him. 

The room was not large — perhaps some nine 
feet high, some eight feet wide. The walls were 
of such exquisitely grooved and polished red ma- 
hogany that the candle-light was reflected in 
them as in mirrors ; one seemed to be surrounded 
by twinkling red stars. On each side of the 
opening stood a tall and narrow cabinet, some- 
what like a high-boy, and in one corner was a 
chest with iron clasps and handles. Over in an- 
other corner was a heavy, medium-sized square 
table, on which stood a blackened candelabrum 
and a tarnished silver-gilt cup. There were two 
chairs drawn up to this table. On one of them, 
fallen forward, was something. 

Mr. Jelnik placed the candles in the empty 
sconces. We two stood looking down, he with 
pity, I with a mounting, sick horror, at the thing 


280 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


before us — the poor, huddled thing that had lain 
there so long. For it was not, as one might sup- 
pose at first glance, a frayed and threadbare man- 
tle flung across one corner of the table. By the 
long black hair it was a woman, and a young 
woman. 

She had on what must once have been a most 
beautiful brown silk dress, trimmed with quan- 
tities of fine lace, and looped up over a stiff bro- 
caded petticoat. Her skeleton feet were in the 
smallest of low-cut shoes, the tarnished silver 
buckles of which were set with rhinestones. Her 
head rested on her arm, outflung across the table. 
The other arm hung limp, and the fingers pointed 
downward, as if accusingly. She had quanti- 
ties of glorious black hair, and this alone had 
death respected ; nothing else of her loveliness re- 
mained. Under her fleshless hand lay the soiled 
and yellowed papers she had written, and over 
which, in biting mockery, she had kept watch 
and ward. 

“ Who is it? Oh, God, God ! — who is it? ” I 
gasped, and heard my voice rattling in my throat 
like a dying woman’s. As, perhaps her voice had 
rattled, here in the dark. The thought of her, 
sitting here in awful loneliness these long, long 
years, while life, all unknowing, ebbed and flowed 
within reach of her, made me shudder. 

“ It is Jessamine Hynds, lost Jessamine 


THE DEVILL HIS RAINBOW 281 


Hynds,” said her kinsman of a later day, look- 
ing down upon the wreck of her with compassion. 

“ But how — how — why did she come here? 
To die thus — Oh, my God ! my God ! ” 

“ I saw the papers under her hand, and her 
name written upon the first pa ge,” he said. 
“ What further things she has wTitten, I do not 
know. I waited, Sophy, until we should read it 
together.” He smiled at me wanly. “ I could 
bear it better, with you beside me. You see how 
much I need you ! ” And he took the papers from 
her and spread them upon the table. What she 
had written I shall insert here, as its properest 
place. 

I, Jessamine Hynds, Gentlewoman, being of sound 
Mind (though they do say I am mad) but of infirm 
Body, the which I am shortly to be rid of, do state 
and declare before God that it was I who did take the 
Hynds Jewells, being help’d thereto by black Shooba the 
witch doctor, who was my father’s man before my Uncle 
James Bought him at the Publiek Outcry of our Effects. 

As to the Why & Wherefore I have act’d thus, thou 
knowest, thou cruel God, who made me a beggar’d Orphan, 
a poor dependant in this House of Pride! 

Yet, God, thou knoweth I lov’d them well enow until 
Richard came home the last Time from Abroad, a Young 
Man in the Beauty of his Youth, who saw not Jessamine 
the poor Cozzen, but Jessamine the fair woman. He 
would have me sing him Ballads, he would hang Entranc’d 
upon the Spinet when I play’d. Now would he fetch me 
a flower for my hair, placing of it himself. And now 


282 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


’t was a knot of ribband for my dress, and himself fetch’d 
home broach and ear-rings for my Birthday Gift, saying 
in my ear no fairer woman’s face had gladded his eyes 
since he left home. And by the dipt Hedge on a May 
night he kiss’d me. Alas, oh blind high God, alas, alas! 

’T was Wondrous to see how even the Servants did catch 
the Humour, they waiting upon me Marvelous ready. Un- 
til came my dear Aunt, smiling sickly, and laying of her 
Hand upon my Sholder said she must speak for mine own 
Good. Richard was but a young Man, wild & headlong, 
and I a fair Woman thrown in bis Way in an empty be- 
tween whiles ere his own true love came. See to it, Jes- 
samine, says she, that a Boy’s short-liv’d Fancy makes not 
a mock of thee, at thy years, that should know better! 

Mine Uncle ever twitt’d me for liking of Books, & 
laugh’d when I beg’d I might have my Chance of Becom- 
ing an Artist. “ What,” says he, “ a Hynds woman paint- 
ing of strange folks their faces'? Out upon thy notion, 
J essamine ! ” And my Cozzens laugh’d and said, Ever did 
Gentlemen dislike a Leara’d Female. Should have gotten 
me a good Husband this Ten Years since but for my 
Shrew’s Temper & Vanity of Books. 

To cure me they did Cruelly bait me to Marry the Pursy 
Ninny that hath the Plantation beyond the Hopes, he that 
hath been Ogling of me for years. Could scratch the 
Wretch his eyes Out! Puffeth with his mouth in a way 
hateful to me & hath pig’s jowls. Yet were all they fair 
mad I should marry me this Paragon. Should have a home 
of mine Own, worthy a Lady. Aye, — and be out of the 
way. lest I lead Richard Astray. 

Mine Uncle chid me for Ingratitude to God in that 
I stamp’d my foot and said No! But Richard laugh’d at 
the idea of Jessamine wedding yon tun. Quoth Richard, 
“Let Jessamine be, all of ye! she is meat for his masters.” 


THE DEYILL HIS RAINBOW 283 


Freeman smil'd sourly, & shrug'd. I love not Freeman, 
nor do I hate him overmuch though he call'd me “ Madame 
Jezebel." 

And then came Emily home from Visiting of her Aunts 
in London Town. And they made a Marriage between her 
and Richard, Richard that was mine. He had lov'd me 
an they had let us be. Once pledg'd, he had held fast 
to his word. Nor would I, for his own Soul's sake, have 
let him go. There is none, none under the sun but me 
alone, was strong enough to have sav'd Richard. 

'T is true, as men judge such things, his Conduct to me 
was but Gallant Pleasantry, such as Fine Gentlemen do show 
to Favour’d Ladies. And he did Spare my Pride. Never 
did he show by word or Deed, or admit to any, that I had 
car'd more Deeply than he. But Emily knew. I knew 
she knew. Saw it in her Eyes, that look'd on me with 
Pity. I will not brok that any mortal Woman shall Pity 
me! 

Secretly I suffer'd, suffer'd so that a Burning fire crept 
& crept into my Brain and Stay'd, nor has left me, Day 
or Night. And in all the World was no one I might Weep 
before, or that would Comfort me and leave me Unasham'd, 
save Shooba, the witch doctor, whom the slaves Fear for 
that he hath a Snake-soul and makes Charms and casts 
Spells. 

'T is true, that Shooba hath a Spiritt. When it worketh 
upon him he is Dull and Overcast and may not Labour 
untill it be gone. And then will he rise and Speak strange 
and sometimes Terrible things, and Prophesy. In the old 
times my Father smil'd, and let him be. But here 'tis 
otherwise. When Shooba's Spiritt made him Heavy and 
Sleepy, and when he woke again and Spoke, mine Uncle's 
new Overseer had the old man Whip't. Twice did this 
Happen before I knew of It. 


284 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


Then went I to the Overseer, with Indignation, and said : 
“ Do not whip Shooba, any more. ’T is Monstrous, to 
Whip an old man that hath a Spiritt ! ’T is not true he 
makes dissentions and plots Revolt among the slaves. 
*T is not true he is lazy & will not Work. There is no bet- 
ter Workman than Shooba. ’T is only true you are a cruel 
man and misuse your Power.” 

Flick’d with his Whip his worsted Stockings. Said in 
a hateful voice: “ ’Taint your place, Miss, to be a-giving 
of orders to the Overseer. I take orders only from them 
that has the right to Give ’em. When I think that old 
Nigger ought to be whipt, whipt he ’ll be.” 

Then march’d he to mine Uncle and ask’d was Mistress 
Jessamine to oversee the Overseer, and call him hard Names 
for the whipping of a Troublesome Nigger? And my 
Uncle fell into a Fury With me. Allowed the wretch to 
Triumph. Shooba was whipt again. I saw his Back. 

Once old Shooba cur’d me of a pestilent Fever, with 
Simples, when I was a little Child, and our Leech had 
given me Over, nor did he Bleed me once. Now Shooba’s 
Back was Bleeding, and I might not help him ! 

Now in the night I had gone secretly to his Hut to fetch 
him such poor little Comforts as I might secretly get & 
give. He took them, & look’d at me long & long, with 
his brooding, deep, strange eyes. 

“For the man that whipt me, I have sent forth my 
Snake. My Snake will have a Thing to say to him. The 
man will die. Then laughed he, and hugg’d his knees. — 
And ’t is true Meekins the Overseer one week later was 
bitten by a Serpent in the Field and died an Unlovely 
Death. 

“Missy,” whispered Shooba, “in my country when I 
young, chief get mad with chief more stronger, not fight 
with spears. Call Witch doctor and make Medicine. 


THE DEVILL HIS RAINBOW 285 

Stronger chief, him come dead one day soon. Maybe 
bumbye you and me make some Medicine'?” My lips 
curl’d somewhat. Poor old Shooba making medicine 
against the Hyndses. “ You go now and think some. I stay 
here, and think some, too. Maybe one time you find medi- 
cine. Maybe one time my Snake find.” 

I went away, smiling sadly. ’T would need strong medi- 
cine to heal me and Shooba ! 

Now Time pass’d, and they fell to planning for Free- 
man’s Ball. ’T was to be a Grand affair, and there was 
Talk of my Aunt’s Frock, and wearing of the Hynds 
Jewells. And Richard’s Wife was to be Allow’d to wear 
the Queen’s Emerald. 

Came Emily to me in secret, and says she, “ Come, Jes- 
samine, be Friends with me. My Mind is Fix’d you shall 
Outshine all the other Ladies. I have the very Frock for 
you, just new come from London, a lustrous thing will 
make you glow & Sparkle like a Ruby. We shall make it 
a State Secret, Jessamine. Not a word shall be breath’d, 
but you shall burst upon them all like a Meteor ! ” 

I do admit that ever was something Noble & Generous 
in Emily, that something in myself did Honour. I had 
thank’d her Thought, but that Richard came in & kiss’d 
her for it, saying he een Lov’d her the Better for that 
she lov’d his haughty Cozzen. But, 0 God, they Two went 
away Hand in Hand! He forgot me for her sake, so 
completely that he said not even, “ Good-by.” 

That night went I to Shooba secretly, and said, “ Is thy 
Snake awake? For A Thought is in my mind.” Then 
took we Counsel together. Shooba is a man most cun- 
ning in all manner of Herbs and Simples. They in Hynds 
House began for to sleep sweetly and soundly, but felt 
no ill Effects. Nay, they rose betimes most pleasantly 
rest’d & refresh’d. 


286 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


Then did Shooba and I, who thus had undisturbed Ac- 
cess to my Aunt’s room, work swiftly until Dawn. Three 
nights and a half night did we two work, before our Task 
was compleat’d, the Kernell’s filch’d from the Nuts, and 
the Empty Shells left for my lady’s adorning of herself 
at my lord’s birth-night Ball. 

Oh, ’t was a rare, rare Jest! I laugh’d and old Shooba 
laugh’d. And I did chap them atween my hands, those 
flaming Bawbles, as children chap chaff. And they did 
sparkle & glow like the Devill his Rainbow! All day 
was I Happy, Hugging of my Secret to my Heart. 

Emily had the brown dress brought Secretly into the 
House, & Made for me in mine Own Room. Once was she 
wishful I might wear one of the Hynds Rubies, just for 
one Night, but I chid her, saying that already the Frock 
was more than Enough. Indeed ’t is a beautiful Dress. 
Will serve me well for a Shroud. 

Ever came the Ball nearer & nearer, and all we a-flutter, 
I with my hands overfull, my hours overcrowd’d, with Help- 
ing of them. I could not have slept in peace did I not 
know what was a-coming. 

And then open’d they the Safe in my Aunt’s morning- 
room. Shall be such a Howling from the Damn’d on the 
Day of Judgment as went up from Hynds House that 
day! Makes me to think of the text, And there shall be 
weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth. 

Lord, how did they run Hither & Thither, what Wailing 
& Reproaching & Accusing & Screeching! How did my 
dear Aunt’s eyes grow Redder than ever Mine had been! 
How did my Proud Uncle find his Lofty Crest Lower’d, 
and was in that Honour of his Scourg’d more Cruelly than 
ever old Shooba’s Back had been ! How, too, was her 
Happiness burst like a Bubble, that had been so rainbow 
Bright! In that house all wept save me alone. Nor did 


THE DEVILL HIS RAINBOW 287 


one of them so much as dream in ’s sleep of suspecting 
Jessamine Hynds! 

And then — oh, God! oh, God — Richard, my Richard, 
that I Lov’d more than mine own Soul, died ! As a Candle 
is snuff’d out, so went Richard that was so comely and so 
strong. I had only thought to Punish him, Make them all 
Suffer to Pay me for mine own Suffering. Never, never, 
had I meant that Richard should Die. ’T was a Thunder- 
bolt upon my Head, ’t was Lightning splitting my Heart. 

’T was I brought the News of Richard’s death to my 
Uncle James. Was sitting in the Library pretending for 
to read. Then came I in, and clos’d the Door, and said: 

“ Bichard is dead” How the man star’d ! Had a ruddy 
face, very Handsome. Before my eyes it pal’d and pinch’d. 
I said again: “ Don’t you understand? Bichard is dead” 

As a tree falls, he fell. I knew his Time was come, and 
gently I rais’d him. He claw’d at his Breast and mouth’d 
u Richard — Freeman — Pocket-book — The Key, the 
Key ! ” Look’d at me piteously. ’T would melt one’s 
Heart to see his Eyes. 

I did thrust my hand into the breast of his blue Broad- 
eloath Coat, and draw forth his Pocket-Book. ’T was in 
Dark Green leather, & upon it the Arms of our House. 
There were bank-notes in ’t, some silver, two or three 
folded papers, and one in a small silk Cover, put by itself. 
I saw his Fading Eyes brighten as I held it up. He maw’d, 
“ Key — Freeman — ” and puff’d with his Lips, and fell 
Unconscious. I slipt the Book back into his breast, put the 
silk-covered paper in mine own, and ran out of the Room, 
Calling Loudly for help. 

He dy’d that Night. And when I look’d at the “ Key ” 
’twas naught but a silly Verse. Yet I was doubtful of 
Giving it to Freeman. Instead, I did show it to old 
Shooba. 


288 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


“ I will ask my Snake if lie knows anything of Keyes,” 
said Shooba. And remembering the Overseer, I did not 
smile, but gave him the Paper. I like not to think of 
Shooba’s Snake. 

Then buried we mine Uncle in the Hynds tomb and my 
Aunt was left to wander ghostlike, seeking for what she 
should never find. — Oh, why did not they leave Richard and 
me alone! 

I repent not. But I am Troubled because of Richard 
who comes in the Night and looks at me, and asks, without 
anger, only with Sorrow, “ Was it well done , Jessamine?” 
I answer, weeping; “ Richard, it was to be. You made 
me Love you, Richard, and you put me by. For which 
Cause, and for that their Pride was beyond Bearing, did 
I pull down the Roof of Hynds House over their heads, 
and these my Hands did push you into your Grave. But 
go you back to Sleep, my dearest Dear. I shall Find mine 
Own Grave shortly, and then I shall be able to come closer 
to you. When I am Dead, Richard, you will understand.” 

Sometimes he will go, looking at me over his Sliolder 
with Eyes so sad that for Pity I must weep mine own 
eyes Blind. But sometimes he will say, in a Voice none 
may hear but me: “ Cruel, cruel Jessamine! You shall 
not come near me even when you are Dead: You shall be 
Farther from me than when we two walk’d Quick under 
the Sun. Never, never did you truly Love me : I know, the 
Dead being Wiser than the Living! ’T is Emily Lov’d me 
truest.” 

And oh, thou awful, far-off God, I cannot make him 
Understand! And unless I can make him understand, 1 
am lost! My misery, my misery! He will not listen. I 
am dying of this thing! 

Now did Shooba’s Death-in-Life come upon him once 
more, and for a day and a night he lay Stark. And in the 


THE DEVILL HIS RAINBOW 289 


Sleep his Snake came and show’d him the untying of the 
Knot, and the Turning of the Keye. In proof whereof 
Shooba took me by the hand & Show’d me the Watcher 
in the Darke. 

“Do but one thing more for me, old Shooba: Put out 
the Fire in my Brain, Shooba, for I would Sleep. And I 
would Sleep here, in Secret, where none but the Watcher 
may see.” 

For a while he ponder’d, Watching of me with still 
eyes. 

“Not good to stay awake too long. You shall Sleep,” 
he said. 

Last night he Brought me the Pinch of Powder that is 
an Open Door. To what? I know not. But I go with- 
out Fear, because without Hope. So shall I sleep in the 
secret Chamber, and it maybe I shall Dream that Richard 
lightly Lov’d and as lightly Left me. Whereof Richard 
Died. And, that Freeman thinks his Brother Guilty and 
a Thief: A Hynds a Thief! so that Hynds House hangs 
Heavy above his head. And that Emily begins to Hate 
Freeman, who Loves her. She thinks he hath play’d Judas. 
I shall have Pleasant dreams! 

Never shall they Find where Shooba hid the Gems, be- 
tween a night and a morning. Never shall any look upon 
my face more, nor read what I have written, nor know 
what I have done. I repent not, 0 God! What I am I 
am, Not I but Thou hast created me! Having liv’d mine 
own Life, I do die mine Own Death. 

Jessamine Hynds. 

“ This is the Horror that we have — felt ! ” I 
babbled. “ She ’s been sitting here — by herself 
— all the time — •” and my voice failed me, re- 
membering that dark and anguished sense of guilt 


290 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


and ruin, of unease and terror, that at times fell 
upon one in the night like a smothering gar- 
ment. Cold drops came upon my forehead, when 
I reflected that we had been living under the same 
roof with This, and we all unknowing. And I 
began to whimper : “ I cannot stay even one 

night more under the same roof with her. I 
cannot ! I cannot ! ” 

“ Sophy,” said Nicholas Jelnik’s quiet voice, 
“ I brought you here because I relied upon your 
courage, your common sense, and your charity.” 

I gulped. In the most matter-of-fact manner, 
he gave me another whiff of that incomparable 
perfume, and I felt my taut nerves steady. Not 
untruthfully had the Coptic physician claimed 
magic qualities for that perfume. 

Mr. Jelnik said gently: “ Had you been other 
than you are, I would not have dared call you 
to my aid to-night. But when I discovered the 
real thief — and she Jessamine Hynds — I could 
not bear that any other eyes than yours should 
see her as she is. And — I want you to be with 
me when I find the jewels.” 

The jewels? I blinked at him. Immersed in 
the tragedy of the woman Jessamine, her piteous 
fate had put all thought of everything save her- 
self out of my mind. 

“ Shooba hid them, between a night and a 
morning. Shooba brought her here, between a 


THE DEVILL HIS RAINBOW 291 


night and a morning. Where should the jewels 
be but here?” 

At his words the grim and mocking ghost of 
that terrible old African, who had been whipped 
for falling into trances, and who had so tragi- 
cally revenged himself and his slighted mistress, 
seemed to rise behind all that remained of her. 

“ Yes, he would put them where she could keep 
watch over them. Why should she come here, 
make her way through those dreadful passages, 
save for that? Think of her stealing out of her 
room in the dead of night, coming alive to what 
she knew was her tomb, shutting that door upon 
herself — ” I looked at the tarnished cup, and 
hoped that the witch doctor’s potion had given 
her a speedy sleep. I looked at the black- 
ened candelabrum, and wondered whether that 
candle had gone out before she had, or whether 
her head had fallen upon her arm, and she had 
died wide-eyed in the black, black dark. The 
cold grue shook me again, and I beat my hands 
together for terror and pity. 

“ Do not think of that ! ” said Mr. Jelnik. 
“ Death rectifies human wrongs, and all of them 
have long, long since been healed of their hurts. 
Come, let us find the jewels. We are losing 
time.” 

We opened the cabinets first. They held pa- 
pers that had been precious in their day — old 


292 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


deeds, old charters and grants, with the king’s 
seals and the signatures of the Lords Proprietors 
upon them; correspondence, a casual glance at 
which showed Revolutionary activities — a hang- 
ing matter once, but harmless enough now; a 
box of foreign coins, all gold ; a charge, in 
medieval Latin, on fine parchment, which exquis- 
itely illuminated initial letters; a plain silver 
chalice and a patten ; some threadbare robes and 
regalia, and a gavel ; a most carefully done chart 
of the Hynds family, ending, however, with Col- 
onel James Hampden Hynds himself; two letters, 
and a miniature of Charles the First; letters 
signed, “ Yours, B. Franklin,” “ Yours, John 
Hancock”; several from “Geo. Washington.” 

The chest held two uniforms, one British, 
the other buff and blue ; a pair of pistols, spurs, 
and a sword. The buff-and-blue uniform was 
worn and stained, with a burnt and ragged hole 
in the breast. It had belonged, said the slip 
pinned to it, to “ Captain Lewis De Lacy Hynds, 
my youngest Brother, the youngest of our House, 
who Fell Gloriously at the Battle of Cowpens.” 

And that was all. Although we examined 
every inch of that floor, every board of the walls, 
and made the most scrupulously careful search 
of the cabinets and the chest. I even dared pass 
my hands over Jessamine herself. 

Shooba the witch doctor had done the unex- 


THE DEVILL HIS RAINBOW 293 


pected. Wherever he might have hidden them 
between a night and a morning, he had not hid- 
den the Hynds jewels in the secret room of Hynds 
House. And she who alone could have solved the 
mystery and told us the truth, lay there with a 
lipless mouth. 


CHAPTER XVII 


ON THE KNEES OF THE GODS 

E gave over the futile search at last. Mr. 



Jelnik sat down and took his head in his 


hands, for the moment a prey to overwhelming 
disappointment. I could have wept for him. 
Presently : 

“ Is it so hard to lose that which you never 
possessed? ” I ventured to ask. 

“ It is always bitter to fail.” 

“ But you have n’t really failed. You have 
succeeded in proving that both Richard and 
Freeman were the victims of an insane jealousy 
and a terrible revenge.” 

“ Jessamine’s confession might well be set 
aside: insane people often accuse themselves of 
crimes committed only in their own disordered 
brains. The one indisputable proof would be 
the jewels in my hands.” He added, with a faint 
smile : “ I should have liked to see those ac- 

cursed things made clean by your wearing them, 
Sophy.” 

“ I don’t want them ! ” I said, and my head 


294 


ON THE KNEES OF THE GODS 295 


went up. “ I don’t care that for all the Hynds 
jewels ever lost ! I would n’t have come here to- 
night for their sake or mine, not if they were 
worth an empire’s ransom! I wanted them for 
Richard’s sake, and — and yours.” 

“ I know, I know. At first I wanted them for 
him and me, too. Afterward I wanted them for 
him and for you, Sophy.” 

“ For me? / have no right to them. What 
have 1 to do with Hynds jewels?” And then I 
stopped. If Jessamine’s confession were true — 
and I believed in my heart that every word Jessa- 
mine had written was the truth — what right had 
I to Hynds House itself? “ As to that, I have no 
right to Hynds House, either. It is yours,” I 
said. 

He stared at me thoughtfully. 

“ It is yours,” I repeated, gaining courage. “ I 
am an outsider, to whom this house was left 
from motives of malice and revenge. Mr. Jelnik, 
this thing must be set straight. We will show 
Jessamine’s confession and clear Richard’s name. 
We will bring Freeman’s diary forward to prove 
the truth of our assertions. Then you can come 
into your own.” 

“Ah!” said Mr. Jelnik, gently, “I see. 
Quite simple, and perfectly feasible. And after 
I have taken Hynds House, what of you? What 
do you get? ” 


296 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


“ I get out,” I said briefly. And a horrid 
qualm came over me. Leave Hynds House, for- 
ever? Go away from Hyndsville, leaving this 
friendlier, pleasanter, happier life behind? 

“ You are forgetting my training,” I reminded 
him, trying to keep my voice steady. “ I can 
always do what I did before I came here. I — 
I ’m really an excellent private secretary, Mr. 
Jelnik.” 

“ That,” said Mr. Jelnik, smiling curiously, 
“ may very well be. But I think the stars in their 
courses fought to bring you here. And I really 
do not at all relish the notion of your turning 
backward into a private secretary, although 
there is, of course, the alternative of The Author. 
And what of Alicia? ” 

“ Alicia’s sense of justice is quite as well de- 
veloped as mine,” I told him proudly. 

“ Alicia is a dear girl,” he agreed. “ But, my 
dear lady, your plan would n’t hold water in 
any court. This place is n’t mine, legally or mor- 
ally, though the jewels would be if I could find 
them. If ever I do find them, which is highly im- 
probable, I may be tempted to make you an offer 
of exchange.” 

“ You don’t want Hynds House? Richard’s 
house? You won’t take Hynds House? ” 

“ I don’t want Hynds House. I won’t take 


ON THE KNEES OF THE GODS 297 


Hynds House. Further, if anybody on earth but 
you made me such an offer, in such circum- 
stances, I should find it hard to forgive. Even 
from you I hardly think I could bear it twice/’ 
A bright red showed in his cheeks for an instant, 
his nostrils quivered, his whole face was a blaze 
of pride. “ What ! Nicholas Jelnik accept gifts 
from women? ” 

“ As good and proud men as Nicholas Jelnik 
have accepted gifts from women, and been none 
the worse for it,” said I, tartly. “ You offered 
me your jewels. Why should n’t I offer you my 
house? — particularly when it should have been 
your house. I also have my pride, Mr. Jelnik! ” 

The hauteur went out of his face, and some- 
thing sweet and quizzical and boyish flooded it. 

“ Keep Hynds House, dear, dear Donna Quix- 
otta,” said he, gently. “ You have given me 
something I needed a thousand times more.” 

Now, although we had not found the jewels, 
we had found Jessamine Hynds, and there re- 
mained to be done a thing that called for what 
strength of will and courage we possessed. And 
we had need to make haste. Already more time 
had been consumed than we bargained for. 

Mr. Jelnik fetched a deep breath, and went 
over to the Thing in the chair. There was in his 
manner neither repugnance nor horror, nothing 


298 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


but an almost divine compassion. Never, never, 
had I respected the courage, the honor, the mercy 
of man so greatly as I did then. 

It was a ghastly task ; I do not like to remember 
it. In the hot, dry air of the room without win- 
dows she had become, not a bleached skeleton, but 
a shriveled, fleshless, blackened mummy. The 
hair still clung tightly to the skull, the discolored 
skin was stretched over the bony contour of the 
face ; the lips had shriveled away from the teeth, 
which showed in a sort of jeering grin. And — 
well, we had to tie her hair, like a rope, around 
her chest and arms; and I tore the ruffles off my 
petticoat, to tie her skirts at the knees and ankles. 

The brown frock was low-necked and short- 
sleeved, too. And the picture of her, down- 
stairs, showed her with so red a lip, so round an 
arm, so soft, so white a bosom ! 

Thou might’st think thou hadst drunk the water of Para- 
dise who had tasted the nectar of her lip. . . . The ends 
of her ringlets fell into the hand like as the sleeve of the 
generous in the hand of the needy. 

Oh, Jessamine! 

She had been so splendidly tall a woman, that 
as he held her grisly head upon his shoulder the 
little shoes that rattled upon her shriveled feet 
were well below his knees. One great rope of 
her blue-black hair escaped and fell down the 
back of his white coat, and as he moved it moved, 


ON THE KNEES OF THE GODS 299 


too, with a lazy and languid coquettishness hor- 
ribly travesting youth and beauty. It was such 
wonderful hair! Small wonder young Richard 
had praised its dark splendor, and kissed its 
shining folds to his undoing ! 

“ Jessamine,” Nicholas Jelnik said as he bent 
oyer her, “you shall have your chance to rest. 
You shall sleep under the open sky. Nature 
shall have you, Jessamine, and make you over 
into something of loveliness and of peace.” 

“ Because she loved much, much shall be for- 
given her,” I whispered. Ah! At the last, who 
but Him of Galilee shall speak for us? 

Never, until I shall be what she was then, shall 
I be able to forget that return journey. Mr. Jel- 
nik walked ahead, holding her on one arm, and 
carrying the flash-light with his free hand. I fol- 
lowed with a candle that burned with a low and 
reddish glare and gave off a heavy, waxy odor in 
the still air. Whenever the faintest draft lifted 
the dull flame, we two living creatures seemed to 
recede into darkness, while the light sought her 
out and stayed upon her. The motion of his 
body shook her lightly, and she gave forth a dry 
and stealthy rattling, an uneasy rustling. One 
hand hung down, with a loose, loose bracelet 
jingling on the brittle brown wrist. And her 
poor little feet with the rotting shoes upon them 
moved delicately, as if they trod the impalpable 


300 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


air. Once her head struck, with a hollow thud, 
as we turned a corner. It was almost more than 
flesh and blood could bear, — like things you 
were afraid of when you were a child in the 
dark — the candles melting audibly, and walls, 
walls, pressing us in. 

I think it took us years to reach the room 
where Achmet waited. At sight of what the mas- 
ter bore, The Jinnee started up and called upon 
God the Lord Paramount, Help of the Faithful. 
Then, like the fine old fighter he was, he squared 
his shoulders, folded his arms, and waited or- 
ders. Boris, with a deep-throated, smothered 
growl of fear and protest, bared his teeth and 
sidled against him, bristling and trembling. 

We consulted briefly. Mr. Jelnik was for leav- 
ing her there in the cellar room, until a fitter 
opportunity offered to give her sepulture. But 
to this I vehemently objected. I could not 
have stayed another hour in that house while I 
knew she was in it. I wanted Jessamine Hynds 
consigned to the grave from which she had been 
too long kept. I wanted her to sleep in the 
brown bosom of the earth, with the impartial 
grass to cover her, and roses to blow over her by 
and by, when summer should have come back to 
South Carolina. 

Achmet led the way, and presently we were in 
the spring-house. When I am feverish I dream 


ON THE KNEES OF THE GODS 301 


of that last climb up the spidery stair, with 
Jessamine’s jaws widened into a soundless laugh, 
and The Jinnee’s light playing at hide-and-seek 
upon her. 

I knelt down and plunged my face into the 
cold spring-water, and drank and drank. How 
good it was ! And how grateful to my lungs was 
the outside air, so sweet, so fresh, so clean! I 
loved the friendly trees waving in the good wind, 
I blessed the friendly stars. 

We stopped at Mr. Jelnik’s house, and the 
man Daoud appeared in answer to a low-voiced 
summons and fetched me a most beautiful shawl, 
which I found extremely comfortable. A stately 
and stoical personage was Daoud, unlike shy 
black Achmet, who hid himself from observation 
so thoroughly that people in Hyndsville were not 
aware of his existence. I sat on the steps while 
for Jessamine Hynds was fetched a length of 
canvas, a linen sheet, and a gray army blanket. 
Achmet appeared with spades. And so we set 
out. 

The old cemetery in Hyndsville, unlike the 
newer one in which folks take a sort of ghastly 
pride, one lot differing from another lot in glory, 
is an unpretentious place, enclosed by crumbling 
walls, the iron gates of which have rusted ajar. 
It is a grassy, bird-haunted, tree-shaded spot, 
with some dozen or so old family vaults, some 


302 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


modest monuments that bear stately names, some 
raised marble slabs supported on carved and 
slender legs, like Death’s own little card-tables, 
some stones let flat into the earth, with names 
and dates long since erased by rain and wind and 
fallen leaf. Nobody comes here any more. 
Sophronisba Scarlett was the first and last to be 
interred in the old cemetery within the memory 
of the present generation. 

We went down dismal paths where the night 
wind sighed a miserere in the cedars, and things 
of the dark scurried away with furtive noises, 
or flapped ill-omened black wings overhead. In 
a corner shaded by cypresses was the Hynds 
vault, a venerable affair with a slate roof. Out- 
side, in an inclosed space were some marble- 
covered graves and in a corner the simplest of all, 
one marked “ R. H.” Emily slept beside him, 
and their son beside her. But on the farther side, 
next the wall, was room for one more sleeper. 
And here, while Mr. Jelnik laid down his burden, 
Daoud and Achmet began to dig. 

She lay there in the ghostly light and shade, 
so utterly cast aside and forgotten, so unloved, 
so unwept, so far removed from every human 
tie, that terror and pity filled my heart. While 
Daoud and Achmet were making ready her bed, 
Nicholas Jelnik and I spread out the length of 
canvas, and wrapped her securely in the sheet 


ON THE KNEES OF THE GODS 303 

and blanket. We folded her claws upon the 
empty breast in which had once pulsed the pas- 
sionate heart of Jessamine Hynds, and spread 
her hair over what had been her face. 

Over in a sheltered spot behind the vault 
clambered a huge, overgrown, briery rose, and by 
some sweet impatience of nature one shoot had 
budded before its time. I broke off the small, 
pale roses and placed them in her grasp. But 
Mr. Jelnik took from his breast a pearl and 
silver crucifix, and this, reverently, he laid upon 
hers. 

“ It was my father’s grandmother’s. She held 
it when she was dying. She was an old saint. 
It would please her to know that her crucifix 
should stay, one holy thing, with Jessamine 
Hynds.” 

“ ‘ Verily , the gate of repentance is not nor 
shall be shut upon God’s creatures until the sun 
shall rise in the west/” The Jinnee quoted his 
Prophet. And he broke off two of his saphics, 
each with a holy verse written upon it, and 
dropped them upon her out of pure charity. 

Daoud, who was intelligent and orthodox 
where Aclimet was emotional and tender, was 
evidently not altogether sure of the wisdom of 
this proceeding; but he was not too orthodox to 
stand up arrow-straight, face the East, and pray 
for her. 


304 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


So we wrapped her, brown silk dress and yel- 
lowed laces, and long black hair, in the strip of 
canvas, and gave her to the earth. The last 
thing we saw, thank God ! before the blanket fell 
over her for the last time, was the silver crucifix 
shining out of the roses in her hands. 

Daoud and Achmet, their spades over their 
shoulders, left the cemetery, the latter the 
strangest, quaintest, most outlandish figure ever 
seen on a Carolina road. Mr. Jelnik and I, with 
Boris close beside us, walked more slowly. 

“ Shall you go on with the search ? ” I ventured 
presently. 

“ But where shall I begin now? ” he wondered. 
“ I have searched everything and every place 
searchable.” 

“ If Shooba hid them anywhere outside of that 
room, it must have been in some place that 
Jessamine herself knew and could get at if she 
wished; some particular place where nobody 
would dream of looking for them. Women al- 
ways choose hiding-places like that, and the no- 
tion would suit Shooba’s grim humor,” I said. 

“ They who knew every nook and cranny of the 
house searched it pretty thoroughly at the time,” 
he reminded me. “ I have fine-combed it myself.” 

“ I am so sorry ! I wanted you to find them. 
But the fact that you didn’t surely couldn’t 
make very much difference to you. One’s hap- 


ON THE KNEES OF THE GODS 305 

piness does n’t depend upon anything so prob- 
lematical.” 

He hesitated. “ Aside from their value, which 
is by no means inconsiderable, I — well, they 
would have made certain things easier for me. I 
should then have been in a better position to do 
what I want to do.” 

“Oh! You had some definite plan which 
hinged upon your finding them ? ” 

He was silent for a space, as if considering 
within himself just how far he could admit me 
into his confidence. 

“ At first, it was a matter of family pride with 
me to clear up this mystery. Later — I wanted 
to have the Hynds jewels in my possession, that I 
might ask the woman I love to marry me.” His 
voice vibrated like a violin string. 

I took the blow standing. I did not wince, 
though it had come unexpectedly. Of course I 
had known all along that there must be some lady 
whom he loved, a woman of that world to which 
he himself belonged. But I couldn’t for the 
life of me imagine how the finding or the not find- 
ing of the Hynds jewels could have any bearing 
upon the ease. I couldn’t understand how any 
woman, any real woman, could let such a thing 
come between her and Nicholas Jelnik. 

When we had walked a little farther: 
“ Does n’t she know you care for her? ” 


306 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


“ Who knows what any woman knows or 
thinks? She may really care for another man.” 
“ There is another man? ” 

“ There is always another man. Her feeling 
for me may be nothing but pure kindness, for she 
is kindness itself.” 

“ Still, I think you should tell her,” I said, 
with such a heavy heart ! 

He shook his head. “ There are reasons why 
my faith might be questioned, my motives 
doubted; and I could n’t bear that.” 

“ But if you are perfectly sure of your own 
feelings, if there is absolutely no doubt in your 
mind that you love her — ” 

“ Love her? I never thought,” he said, “ that 
any woman could mean so much to a man! I 
never dreamed that just one woman could be in 
herself all that a man needs to hold fast to! 
Love her? I have been all over the world and I 
have seen many women in many lands, but never 
any woman of them all, save that one, for me! 
It was a revelation to me, that I could care so 
much. Ah! I wish I could make it plain just 
how much I do care ! ” 

I had not known until that moment how much 
the heart can bear of anguish and not break. 

“ I hope she loves you just as much in return, 
Mr. Jelnik. I hope with all my heart you will be 
happy, both of you.” 


ON THE KNEES OF THE GODS 307 


“ I hope she does ! I hope we shall ! ” he cried, 
with ardor. “ Why, if I could be sure she cares 
for me, like that, if I could know that all other 
men counted as little with her as all other women 
count with me! But I am not sure. And I do 
not take it lightly, for my woman must be more 
to me than most women mean to most men. 
Well, it is on the knees of the gods.” 

I stole a covert glance at him as he walked 
beside me. It seemed to me he had never been 
so beautiful. But his beauty hurt me. I felt 
old, very, very old, and sad, and tired. The 
salt taste of tears was in my mouth. My feet 
dragged. 

We entered that strip of land which on a time 
old Sophronisba barb-wired and barricaded 
against her neighbors, and which touched the 
Jelnik grounds in the rear. We were to cut 
through his garden and enter mine by the gap in 
the hedge behind the spring-house and I hoped to 
get into the house and up-stairs to my own room 
unperceived. 

The gray cottage lay dark and silent, but there 
were lights in Hynds House although the night 
was upon the verge of morning. A gray light, 
upon which was stealing a primrose tinge, was 
already in the sky. It was, in fact, four o’clock. 
I was so mortally tired that for a moment I sat 
down on his steps. 


308 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


“ It ’s been pretty rough on you, Sophy. One 
woman in a thousand could have gone through 
this night's experience without going to pieces, 1 ” 
said Mr. Jelnik, with feeling. And then: 

“ Sophy ! ” cried a frightened and hysterical 
voice. “ Oh, is that you, at last, Sophy? ” And 
turning a corner of the gray cottage, Alicia, 
Doctor Geddes, and The Author confronted 
us. They were still in costume, and the Mephis- 
tophelian effect of The Author was such as would 
turn any actor green with envy. Ensued a preg- 
nant pause. It was a lovely situation! It re- 
duced me, for one, to idiocy. 

“ Sophy! Jelnik!” exploded Doctor Geddes, 
with a gesture of rage and astonishment. 

“ Yes. It is I. What is the matter? Why 
are n’t you home and in bed? What are you do- 
ing here, at this hour? ” I asked, stupidly. 

Here The Author, all in red tights, cape, and 
doublet, snatched his red cap with the cock’s 
feather in it off his head, and bowed diaboli- 
cally : 

“Let us ask you that same question: Why 
are n’t you home and in bed? What are you do- 
ing here at this hour? ” 

“ After everybody had gone home, I ran up to 
your room, Sophy — and — and you were gone. 
You were n’t in the house. I looked everywhere ; 
and you ’d disappeared, as if the earth had 


ON THE KNEES OF THE GODS 309 


opened and swallowed you.” Alicia’s voice was 
trembling. 

“ Oh, Sophy, I was so frightened, so horribly 
frightened! I kept thinking every minute you 
must come. I kept looking and waiting, and still 
you didn’t come. I telephoned Doctor Geddes, 
when I could n’t stand it any. longer. And then 
The Author came down-stairs. And oh, Sophy, 
there was such an unearthly, clammy, waiting 
sort of feeling in the house — all those lights, 
all those empty rooms — I felt as if something 
terrible must be happening ! ” She clung to me 
as she spoke, kissing me, and shook, and wept. 
“ And when you still did n’t come, and we 
couldn’t find you anywhere, The Author sug- 
gested that we should come over here and enlist 
Mr. Jelnik. 

“ When we got here, there was n’t a soul in this 
house. Not even the dog. We went back to 
Hynds House, and walked through our garden, 
and then came back here, because we did n’t know 
what else to do. Oh, Sophy!” I patted her 
shoulders, mumbling that she must n’t cry, it was 
all right. 

“ Miss Gaines, I am dreadfully sorry you 
should have been frightened. But there really 
wasn’t the least occasion for alarm. Because 
Miss Smith was with me” said Mr. Jelnik 
calmly. 


310 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


Alicia looked at him, trying to read his 
face in the wan light. Her world, as it were, 
was rocking under her feet. She looked at me; 
and I said nothing. To save my life I could n’t 
speak of Jessamine Hynds then, nor talk coher- 
ently of that night’s experience. I could n’t be- 
tray Nicholas Jelnik’s secrets, nor mention the 
Watcher in the Dark, nor that dreadful red- 
walled room. So I merely patted Alicia’s shoul- 
der, while she held fast to me as if I might again 
disappear. 

“ That is exactly what we should like you to ex- 
plain, Mr. Jelnik, if you please,” said The Author, 
with deadly politeness. “ You must pardon us 
if we disagree with your assertion that Miss 
Gaines had no real occasion for alarm.” 

“ Miss Smith and I,” said Mr. Jelnik, stiffen- 
ing, at the tone, “ found it absolute necessary to 
leave Hynds House for a short while to-night, to 
attend to — an affair of some importance to us 
both, but which concerns no one else on earth.” 
Under the grave politeness his voice had an 
edge of irritation. “ I repeat that I am sincerely 
sorry Miss Alicia was frightened. For my 
share in that, I crave her pardon. I ask all of 
you to accept this apology as an explanation 
which is final.” 

“ I for one shall do no such thing ! ” cried The 


ON THE KNEES OF THE GODS 311 


Author, hotly. “Are we impertinent children 
to be thus lightly dismissed? Of course, if Miss 
Smith herself — ” 

“ You have neither right nor authority to cross- 
question Miss Smith,” interposed Mr. Jelnik, 
sharply. But Doctor Geddes broke in, with 
mounting anger and astonishment: 

“ Of course we ’ve got the right and the reason 
to question both of you ! You might just as well 
come off your high horse; you ? ve behaved very 
badly, Jelnik! To induce Sophy to scuttle off 
in the middle of the night, without a word to 
anybody, and go wild-goose-chasing with you, 
was an unworthy action. I would n’t have be- 
lieved it of you, Jelnik; I thought you had more 
common sense — not to speak of Sophy herself. 
Gad, I ’d like to shake the pair of you ! ” And 
he stamped his feet. 

“ Doctor Richard Geddes/’ said Mr. Jelnik, in 
dangerously low and honeyed tones, “ I find you 
insufferable. You have the instincts and the 
manners of a navvy.” 

“ Mr. Jelnik ! ” cried The Author. “ Mr. Jel- 
nik, honor me, please, by considering my instincts 
and manners infinitely worse than Doctor Ged- 
des’s. I, Mr. Jelnik, at this instant feel within 
me the instincts of a cave man and I hone for 
the thigh-bone of an aurochs to prove it to you. 


312 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


Do you know what I think of you, Mr. Jelnik? 
I consider you a man without conscience and 
without scruples, sir! ” 

“ My faith ! The man even talks like a 
serial! ” said Mr. Jelnik, weariedly. “ My dear, 
good sir, while we ’re by way of indulging in 
personalities permit me to inform you that you 
annoy me by existing. As to your behavior to 
Miss Smith — ” 

“My behavior to Miss Smith?” shrieked The 
Author, stamping with fury, “my behavior to 
Miss Smith? You had better set about explain- 
ing your behavior to Miss Smith ! You ’re a 
rascal, Mr. Jelnik ! ” 

“ You, my dear sir, are worse: you ’re an ass,” 
said Mr. Jelnik, and fetched a sigh of tiredness. 
“ Would to heaven somebody would fetch you a 
halter ! ” 

“ Jelnik,” choked Doctor Geddes, “ a man who 
behaves as you ’re behaving to-night runs the risk 
of getting himself shot. You ’re my own cousin, 
but — ” 

Mr. Jelnik turned at bay. 

“ Doctor Geddes,” said he, in a razor-edged 
voice, “it is no light affliction to be kin to the 
Hyndses! — What do you want me to explain? 
I have already told you it was necessary for 
Miss Smith and me to attend to a matter that is 
none of your business. In return, you hold us up 


ON THE KNEES OF THE GODS 313 

like brigands. Would it make a dent in your 
armor of righteous meddling, if I were to remind 
you that you are seriously annoying Miss 
Smith? ” 

u Not a dent!” roared the doctor. “ And if 
it annoys Sophy to be asked a straight question 
by those who have her interest at heart, let her 
be annoyed and take shame to herself!” 

Alicia began to cry. 

“ Oh, Sophy ! ” wailed Alicia, “ whatever is the 
matter with us, anyhow? What is wrong, 
Sophy? Why are we quarreling? What are we 
quarreling about, Sophy?” 

I put my hands to my head. “ I don’t know. 
That is, I can’t tell. I mean, I can’t think, at 
all!” 

“ Doctor Geddes has spoken like an honest 
man,” said The Author, standing flat-footed in 
his pointed red shoes. “ Mr. Jelnik, I ask you 
plainly : Why do I find Miss Smith here at this 
hour? Why and wherefore the mystery? Let 
me remind you that I have asked Miss Smith to 
marry me, and that she has n’t as yet given me 
her answer,” he finished, significantly. 

“ Why, Sophy” ! ” gasped Alicia. “ Why, 
Sophy Smith ! ” 

“ Holy Moses ! ” gasped Doctor Geddes. 

“ What, man, you too? Well, then, if it comes to 
that, I can call you to account, Jelnik, because 1 


314 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


asked Sophy to marry me, too. In my case she 
had sense enough to say 6 No ’ at once.” 

“ You know he did, Sophy ! ” Alicia corrobor- 
ated him tearfully. “ You told me so yourself, 
though you never so much as opened your mouth 
about The Author; and I don’t think that was a 
bit like you, Sophy. And why you refused the 
doctor, I can’t for the life of me imagine ! ” 

“ Can’t you? Well, I can,” snorted the doc- 
tor, and drew Alicia closer to him. She put both 
her hands around his arm. 

“ What ! ” gulped The Author, rocking on his 
red toes, and wrinkling his nose until his waxed 
mustache stood out with infernal effect, and his 
corked eyebrows climbed into his hair. “ What ! 
You, Geddes? My sainted aunt! Why, man 
alive, I thought that you — that is I ’d have 
sworn that you — ” Here The Author’s breath 
mercifully failed him. 

I was dumb as a sheep in the hands of the 
slayers. I could only blink at these dear people 
who were tormenting me. I thought of Jessa- 
mine Hynds in her brown silk frock, w T ith the 
crucifix in her skeleton fingers and the earth fresh 
over her. And I could n’t say a word. And 
while I stood thus silent, Mr. Nicholas Jelnik 
walked up and took my hand in his warm and 
comforting clasp, and looked at me with kindling, 
starry eyes, and laughed a deep-chested laugh. 


ON THE KNEES OF THE GODS 315 


“ Gentlemen and Miss Gaines,” said Mr. Jel- 
nik, in a ringing and vibrant voice, “ permit me to 
inform you that I also have asked Miss Smith to 
marry me. And she has done me the honor to 
accept me.” 


CHAPTER XVIII 


THE GREATEST GIFT 

T HE Author threw his short cape back- 
ward, laid one hand upon the hilt of his 
sword, doffed his cap, and made a sweeping court- 
esy. 

“ Prettily played, Mr. Jelnik! ” said he, admir- 
ingly. “ May one he permitted to congratulate 
you, upon your indubitably dramatic instinct? ” 
“ All things are permitted ; but not all things 
are expedient,” Mr. Jelnik replied evenly. 

“ Oh, we know who can quote scripture ! ” cried 
The Author; and looked longingly at the other’s 
naked throat. 

At which point Doctor Geddes, coming as it 
were out of a trance, took the situation in hand. 

“ Have done with this nonsense ! ” he ordered 
sharply. “ Alicia, get Sophy home; she looks 
more dead than alive. Jelnik, your declaration 
puts a new complexion on this affair ; but let me 
tell you flatly I don’t like your method of an- 
nouncing engagements.” 

“ Suppose you waive criticism and look after 

316 


THE GREATEST GIFT 


317 


Sophy,” suggested Mr. Jelnik. He walked up 
to his cousin and looked straight in his eyes: 
“ Richard, you ’re not such a fool as to dare 
doubt us? ” 

“Eh?” blinked the doctor, “what? Doubt 
Sophy? I should say not ! And you — oh, well, 
you ’re a bit of a fool yourself at times, Jelnik, 
and this seems to be one of the times ; but I don’t 
doubt you. However,” said the doctor, grimly, 
“ I should like to whale some sense into you with 
a club ! ” 

“ An ax would be more to the point,” mur- 
mured The Author, regretfully. 

“ In the meantime, Richard,” said Mr. Jelnik, 
with a faint smile, “ take Sophy home, please.” 

I have a vague recollection of swallowing some- 
thing that the doctor told me to swallow. Then 
came blessed oblivion, a sleep so profound that I 
did n’t even dream, and did n’t awake until that 
afternoon ; to find the tender face of Alicia again 
bent over me. 

I waited for her to ask at least one of the many 
questions she must have been longing to ask. 
But Alicia shook her head. 

“ Sophy,” said she, loyally, “ you have n’t got 
to tell me one single, solitary thing unless you 
really want to. But — is n’t this just a bit sud- 
den? I was — surprised.” 

“ So was I.” 


318 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


“ You see, Sophy, I never once dreamed — ” 

“That he cared for me? Neither did I.’’ 

“ No. That you cared for him,” Alicia puck- 
ered her brows. 

“ My dear girl,” I was trying to feel my way 
toward letting her have the truth, “ listen : 
whether or not he is engaged to me, Mr. Nicholas 
Jelnik really loves some lady that neither you 
nor I know. He told me so himself.” 

It took Alicia some moments to recover from 
that ! 

“ And yet you ’re going to marry him, Sophy? ” 

“ You heard him announce our engagement.” 

“ I can’t understand ! ” sighed Alicia. “ Oh, 
Sophy, sometimes I could wish we had never come 
to Hynds House ! ” 

“ It had to be,” I said dully. 

“And — The Author?” ventured Alicia, after 
a pause. “ He thinks you belong to him by right 
of discovery. He does n’t accept Mr. Jelnik’s 
announcement as final. He told me this morning 
that his offer stood until you actually married 
somebody else. The Author is n’t used to being 
crossed, and he does n’t quite know how to take 
it.” 

“ It is on the knees of the gods,” I repeated, 
weariedly. 

Came a gentle tap at the door, and following it 
the fresh, kind face of Miss Emmeline. 


THE GREATEST GIFT 


319 


“ Are you trying to rival the Seven Sleepers? ” 
she asked, gaily, and laid a bunch of carnations 
on my knees by way of offering. “ Judge Gat- 
chell sent them to me this morning,” she ex- 
plained, with an October blush. For the sallow 
old jurist had taken so great a liking to the 
Boston reincarnation of a Theban vestal, and was 
in consequence so rejuvenated, himself, that all 
Hyndsville was holding up the hands of astonish- 
ment and biting the finger of conjecture. 

“ My dears,” said Miss Emmeline, presently, 
“ I want to tell you the singular dream I had last 
night, or rather this morning. I was quite tired, 
for I do not often dance,” admitted Miss Emme- 
line, who had nevertheless danced with a zest that 
rivaled that of the youngest, “ so I must have 
fallen asleep immediately upon retiring. Well, 
then, I dreamed that all those old Hyndses whose 
portraits are down-stairs were gathered together 
in the library, to bid farewell to a member of the 
family who was going away — that beautiful 
creature who disappeared and was never after- 
ward found. Now, are n’t dreams absurd? She 
was setting out upon a long journey dressed in 
a low-necked, short-sleeved brown silk dress 
trimmed with quantities of fine lace. And for 
goodness’ sake what do you think that woman 
wore over it for a traveling-cloak? Nothing 
more or less than a gray army blanket, a corner 


320 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


of which was thrown over her head like a hood 
and qnite concealed her face. 

“ She moved away slowly, holding her blanket 
as an Indian does. And as she passed me by — 
for I was standing in the door — a fold slipped, 
and what do yon think she was holding to her 
breast? A pearl-and-silver crucifix. You can’t 
imagine how I felt when I saw it ! ” 

I knew how I felt when I had seen it, but that 
I could n’t tell Miss Emmeline. Instead, I held 
the carnations to my face, to hide my whitening 
lips. For once the Boston lady had come into 
actual contact with the occult and the unknown. 

“ She went out by the back door,” continued 
Miss Emmeline, “ and I ran to the window and 
saw her gray-blanketed figure disappear down 
the lane, behind the hedge that separates Mr. Jel- 
nik’s grounds from yours. And all the Hyndses 
called: ‘Jessamine, good-by !’ But she never 
turned her head once, nor spoke, nor gave a sign 
that she heard. She just went, leaving me 
staring after her. I stared so hard that I woke 
myself up. Now, my dears, was n’t that an odd 
sort of dream? And so vivid, too! Why, I can 
hear those voices yet ! ” 

“ Well, I ’m glad she went,” said Alicia. “ La- 
dies that do up their heads in blankets and won’t 
answer when they ’re spoken to, ought to go.” 

Mrs. Scarboro, Judge Gatchell, and one of my 


THE GREATEST GIFT 


321 


old ladies were dining with us that night, for 
w T hich I thanked Heaven. Judge Gatehell dis- 
covered in himself a fund of sly humor that as- 
tonished everybody, and Miss Emmeline was like 
a November rose, sweet with a shy and belated 
girlishness, rarer for a touch of frost. And The 
Author was in a fairly good humor because they 
let him alone. 

Mr. Nicholas Jelnik dutifully put in his ap- 
pearance after dinner. The Author was bale- 
fully polite to him, Alicia shyly friendly. I had 
on a new frock, and the knowledge that it was 
becoming gave me a courage I should otherwise 
have lacked. A new frock, pink powder, and a 
smile, have saved many a fainting feminine soul 
w T here prayer and fasting had failed. 

The gentleman who had blandly announced 
my engagement to himself only last night as- 
sumed no airs of proprietorship, but was placidly 
content to let me sit and talk to Mr. Johnson, who 
was holding forth on the merits of our Rhode 
Island Reds as against either barred Plymouth 
Rocks or White Leghorns, and the variety of 
vegetables and small fruits in our kitchen-garden, 
so admirably planned by Schmetz, so carefully 
and neighborly looked after both by him and 
Riedriech. From gardens, Mr. Johnson went to 
cattle; he had a delight in cows, and our cow was 
a Jersey with a cream-colored complexion, large 


322 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


black eyes, and the sentimental temperament. 
We called her the Kissing Cow, because she 
could n’t see the secretary without trying to be- 
stow upon him slobbering salutes. 

He paused in his homely talk to smile at some- 
thing The Author had just said. Then his eyes 
strayed to Mr. Nicholas Jelnik, being talked to 
by Mrs. Scarboro and an apple-faced Confeder- 
ate with pellucid blue eyes and a renowned 
trigger-finger. 

“ That is the most gifted — and detached — 
human being I have ever known,” said the secre- 
tary. “ But it is his misfortune to have no say- 
ing responsibilities. What he needs is to fall in 
love with the right woman and marry her.” 

“ You mean he should marry some great lady, 
some dazzling beauty? Naturally.” 

“ Heaven forbid ! ” said the secretary, with un- 
expected vigor. “ No, no, Miss Smith, that is not 
what such a man as Nicholas Jelnik needs! ” 

“ But it may be what he wants,” said I. 

“ I should never think so, myself,” Mr. John- 
son replied thoughtfully ; “ and I have seen a 
good deal of him. No, Jelnik does n’t want great 
beauty; he has enough of it himself. For the 
same reason, he does n’t want brilliant qualities. 
He needs quiet, dependable goodness, the change- 
less and unswerving affection of a steadfast 
heart.” 


THE GREATEST GIFT 


323 


But I could not agree with this simple-minded 
young man, who had in himself the qualities he 
named. Why, if Nicholas Jelnik asked only for 
a changeless love, I could have given him full 
measure, even to the running over thereof ! 

“ What was Johnson talking to you about, 
that you both looked so earnest? ” Mr. Jelnik 
wanted to know presently. 

“ Oh, just things; flowers and fruits and ani- 
mals.” 

“ And people? ” 

“ People always end by talking about people.” 

“ Johnson’s opinions are generally sound, be- 
cause he himself is sound to the core,” said Mr. 
Jelnik, quietly. 

“ Miss Emmeline says he has got*a limpid soul. 
The Author says it ’s really a sound liver. How- 
ever that may be, one could n’t live in the same 
house with him without conceiving a real affec- 
tion for him. He is a very easy person to 
love.” 

Mr. Jelnik’s eyebrows went up. “ Don’t love 
him too much, please, Sophy. If you feel that 
you really ought to love somebody, love me” 
The golden lights w r ere in his eyes. 

At that moment I both loved and hated him. 

“ Mr. Jelnik,” said I, in as low a tone as his 
own, “ it is n’t fair to talk to me like this. You 
did what you did to save me from annoyance — 


324 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


and — and — misunderstanding. But you are 
perfectly free: I have no idea of holding you 
to such an engagement, no, nor of feeling myself 
bound by it, either.” 

“ I understand, perfectly, Sophy,” he said, after 
a pause. “ And now, may I ask you one or two 
plain questions, please? ” 

“ I think you may.” 

“ You never cared for Geddes? ” 

“Good heavens, no! Besides, he — ” 

“Wants Alicia? That’s obvious. But what 
about The Author? I ’m not enamored of him, 
myself, but he ’s an immensely able and clever 
man. How many brilliant social lights would 
be willing to shine at the head of his table! 
What are you going to do about The Author, 
Sophy? ” 

“ What are you going to do about the lady you 
are really in love with?” I countered. 

“ I ’m waiting to find out,” said he, coolly. 
“ Answer my question, please : Do you imagine 
you love him, Sophy? ” 

“ It is not unpleasant to me that he should 
wish me to do so,” I admitted. 

“ I see. You are trying to persuade yourself 
that you should accept him.” 

“ I am not growing younger,” I said, with an 
effort. “ Remember, too, that Alicia will be leav- 
ing me presently, and I shall then be utterly 


THE GREATEST GIFT 325 

alone. That is not a pleasing prospect — not to 
a woman.” 

“ Nor to a man, either, but better that than a 
loveless marriage.” He reflected for a moment. 
“ If you are sure you care for the man, tell him 
truthfully every incident of last night. Other- 
wise, I do not feel like sharing my affairs with 
him ; I do not want to drag Jessamine Hynds out 
of her grave to gratify his curiosity. For he has 
the curiosity of a cat, along with the obstinacy of 
a mule.” 

I smiled, wanly. “ I gather that I ’m not to 
tell him anything. What further? ” I wanted 
to know, not without irony. 

“ This, then : that you keep on being engaged to 
me.” 

I looked at him incredulously. 

“ For the time being, Sophy, submit to my ten- 
tative claim. If you decide to let your — ah — 
common sense induce you to make what must be 
called a brilliant marriage, tell me, and I will 
go at once. In the meantime, Sophy, I am your 
friend, to whom your happiness is as dear as his 
own. Will you believe that? ” 

It was not in me to doubt him. “ Yes,” I said. 
“ And if — the lady you told me about — you un- 
derstand — -you will tell me, too, will you not? 
I should like to know, for your happiness is as 
much to me as mine could possibly be to you.” 


326 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


“ That ’s the most promising thing you ’ve said 
yet,” he said. “ All right, Sophy : the minute I 
find out she cares more for me than she does for 
anybody else, I shall certainly let you know. In 
the meanwhile, don’t let being engaged bear too 
heavily on your spirits. 7 find it very pleasant 
and exhilarating ! ” 

“ I don’t think you ought to talk like that,” I 
demurred. 

“ I can’t help it : I never was engaged before, 
and it goes to my tongue.” 

“ I never was, either. But it does n’t go to 
mine ” I reminded him, with dignity. 

“ Sophy, you are the only woman in the world 
who can reproach a man w r ith her nose and get 
away with it,” he said irrelevantly. “ You have 
the most eloquent little nose, Sophy ! ” 

I looked at him reprovingly. 

“ I adore being engaged to you, Sophy,” said 
he, unabashed. “ Being engaged to you has a 
naive freshness that enchants me. It ’s romantic, 
it has the sharp tang of uncertainty, the zest of 
high adventure. Think how exciting it ’s going 
to be to wake o’ mornings thinking : ‘ Here is a 

whole magic day to be engaged to Sophy in ! ’ By 
the way, would you mind addressing me as 6 Nich- 
olas ’? It is customary under the circumstances, 
I believe.” 

“ I do not like the name of Nicholas,” 


THE GREATEST GIFT 


327 


“ I feared so, seeing the extreme care with 
which you avoid it. That is why I suggest that 
you should immediately begin to use it. Practice 
makes perfect. Observe with what ease I manage 
to say ‘ Sophy ’ already,” he said airily. “ I ’m 
glad your hair ’s just that blonde, and soft, Sophy. 
I could n’t possibly be engaged to a woman who 
did n’t have hair like jours.” 

I looked at his, and said with conviction: 

“ How absurd ! Black hair is incomparably 
more beautiful ! ” 

His eyes danced. 

“ Sophy ! ” said he, in a thrilling whisper, 
“ Sophy, The Author’s hair is brindle! ” 

I got up and incontinently left him. And I 
saw with stern joy how Mrs. Scarboro again 
seized upon and made him listen to tales of his 
grandfather, until in desperation he fled to the 
piano, and played Hungarian music with such 
effect that even The Author was moved to rap- 
ture. 

“ J elnik ! ” said The Author, enthusiastically, 
“ I shall put you in my next book. Gad, man, 
what a magnificent scoundrel I shall make of 
you ! ” A remark which scandalized Mrs. Scar- 
boro and startled my dear old lady, but did n’t 
phase Mr. Jelnik. 

I found myself growing more and more con- 
founded and confused. Was I, or was n’t I, en- 


328 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


gaged to a man who had never asked me to marry 
him? In the vernacular, I didn’t know where 
I was at any more. 

Alicia added to this confusion. 

“ Sophy/’ said she, some time later, “ is n’t it 
just possible you misunderstood Mr. Jelnik? 
About his being in love with somebody else, I 
mean.” 

“ I don’t know what makes you think so.” 

“ Don’t you? I ’ll show you,” she said, and 
swung me around to face a mirror. “ That ’s 
what makes me think so. Sophy Smith, unless 
he ’s a liar — and Peacocks and Ivory could n’t be 
a liar to save his life — the woman Nicholas Jel- 
nik loves looks back at you every time you look 
in the glass.” 

I shook my head. I have never been able to 
tell pleasant lies to myself. 

“ Well, we ’ll see what we ’ll see ! I told you 
once before that you had n’t caught up with the 
change in yourself.” And she kissed me and 
laughed. It came to me that she could n’t have 
cared much for him, herself, to be able to laugh 
that light-heartedly. 

When Miss Emmeline and the English folk 
were leaving Hynds House, everybody in Hynds- 
ville turned out to say “ Good-by.” Even our 
lanky old Judge was on hand, with a great bunch 


THE GREATEST GIFT 329 

of carnations and a huge box of bonbons for Miss 
Emmeline. 

“ Sophy,” Miss Emmeline said, smiling, “ I 
don’t see anything left for me to do but come 
back to Hyndsville, do you? ” 

“ No, I don’t. And come soon. Hynds House 
won’t feel the same without you. I thought of 
all she had taught me by just being her fine, 
frank self, and looked at her gratefully. She 
looked back at me quizzically, and of a sudden 
she slipped her arm around my shoulders. 

u Sophy Smith,” said she, softly, “ I have met 
many women in my time, many far more bril- 
liant and beautiful, and what the world calls 
gifted, than you. But I have met none with a 
greater capacity for unselfish loving. It ’s easy 
enough to win love, a harder thing to keep it, but 
'Nlivinest of all to give it and keep on giving it. i— 
And there ’s where your great gift Ires, Sophy.” 
And she kissed me, with misty eyes, and such a 
tender face! 

That put such a friendly, warm glow in my 
heart that I was sorry to part even with the Eng- 
lishman’s daughter, Athena though she was, and 
I mortally afraid of her. As for her father, he 
was bewailing the parting with Alicia, whose 
Irishness was a manna in the wilderness to him. 

“ It ’s like saying good-by to the Fountain of 
Youth,” he lamented. “ You ’re more than a 


330 A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 

pretty girl : you ’re the eternal feminine in 
Irish ! ” 

“ She ’s the Eternal Irish in proper English, 
that ’s what she is ! ” said The Author darkly, 
and looked so wise that everybody looked re- 
spectful, though nobody knew what he meant. 
Perhaps he did n’t know, himself. 

After the train had gone, Doctor Geddes 
hustled us into his waiting car. 

“ I ’m going to take you for a quiet spin in 
the country, to make the better acquaintance of 
Madame Spring-in-Carolina,” he said. A few 
minutes later he swung the car into a lonesome 
and lovely road edged with pines, and sassafras, 
and sumach, and cassena bushes, and festooned 
with vines. Madame Spring-in-Carolina had 
coaxed the green things to come out and grow, 
and the people of the sky to try their jeweled 
wings in her fine new sunlight. The Judas-tree 
was red, the dogwood white, the honey-locust a 
breath from Eden. A blossomy wind came out 
of the heart of the world, and there were birds 
everywhere, impudently eloquent. 

We didn’t want to talk, or even to think; we 
just wanted to be alive and glad with every- 
thing else. The very car seemed to feel some- 
thing of this intoxication, for as it went fly- 
ing down the road it hummed and purred and 
sang snatches of the Song of Speed to itself. 


THE GREATEST GIFT 


331 


We turned a corner, I remember. And then 
there was a frightful lurch and jar, and the big 
car bounded into the air, and turned over in 
the ditch. I remember the rear wheels turning 
with a grinding, spitting noise. 

When I woke up, Alicia was sitting by the side 
of the road,, with the doctor’s head in her lap, 
and I was lying on the grass near by. Her eyes 
were big and blank in a bloodless face, and the 
curling ends of her long bright hair hung in the 
dust. There was a cruel red mark on her fore- 
head. Otherwise she was quite uninjured. I 
was n’t conscious of any pain myself — not then, 
at least. 

“ Sophy,” Alicia said, impersonally, “ Doctor 
Geddes is dead.” And she fell to stroking his 
cheek lightly, with one finger; “ quite dead. 
Without one word to me, Sophy ! ” 

The figure on the ground looked dreadfully 
still and helpless. There was something ghastly 
wrong in seeing so strong a man lie so still and 
helpless. And the road, an unfrequented one, 
was unutterably lonesome. There was nothing, 
nobody in sight — nothing but the buzzard, black 
against the blue sky, tipping his wings to the 
wind. 

“ You must go for help,” I mumbled. 

“ I dare not leave him. I know he ’s dead, 
Sophy. But — he might open his eyes, just once 


332 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


more. You see, he did n’t know, before he — 
died, that I was very much in love with him — oh, 
terribly in love with him, Sophy ! — from the 
first time I saw him standing in our door. I 
thought you cared for him, too, Sophy dear — 
and I sent him away from me — And now he has 
gotten himself killed.” With a gentle touch she 
pushed back the thick reddish hair from his fore- 
head. She looked at me imploringly : “ Don’t 

let him be dead, Sophy ! For God’s sake, Sophy, 
don’t let him be dead ! Make him open his eyes, 
Sophy ! ” 

A negro teamster came upon us, recognized 
the doctor, shrieked, and set off for help, lash- 
ing his mules into a mad run. But Alicia never 
moved, and I huddled beside her, numb and si- 
lent, looking at the white face upon her knees. 
With all the impatience wiped out, it was a fine 
face, at once strong and sweet. 

“ Bichard,” said Alicia, “ Richard, if I had 
been killed, and you begged and prayed me from 
your breaking heart to listen to you, to under- 
stand that you ’d cared for me, only me, all 
along, somehow I ’d manage to let you know I 
understood. Richard, listen to me ! Open your 
eyes, Richard. Please, please, Richard, open 
your eyes ! ” 

Her voice was so piteous that I fell to weep- 
ing. And, by the mercy of God, Richard opened 


THE GREATEST GIFT 333 

his eyes and stared with blue blankness straight 
into Alicia’s quivering, anguished face. 

“ Richard,” said she, bending down to him, 
“ my dear, dear love, keep your eyes open just 
a little longer, until I can make you understand. 
Oh, Richard, I cared ! Indeed, indeed, I cared ! ” 

The blue stare never wavered. It gathered in- 
tensity. 

“ Don’t, don’t look at me like that, Richard ! ” 
cried Alicia, beginning to sob wildly. “ Don’t — 
don’t look so — so angelic, dear. Look like your 
own self at me, Richard! Oh, darling, for our 
dear God’s mercy’s sake, please, please try to 
look bad-tempered just once more ! ” 

His pale lips twitched curiously. He sighed. 
Then he murmured something that sounded like 
“ not sure.” 

“ Not sure? ” wept Alicia. " Oh, my heart, 
my heart ! ” 

“ I think — could die in peace — say 4 1 love 
you, Richard,’ ” murmured the doctor. 

“ Oh, I do, I do love you, Richard — fright- 
fully! ” sobbed Alicia. “ I love you with all my 
heart ! ” 

The corpse sat up, and for a dead man he 
showed considerable life. Painfully he rose, and 
stood staggering on his feet, big, pale, shaken, 
with a bump the size of an egg on the side of 
his head, but with such shining blue eyes! He 


334 A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 

put out a big hand and lifted Alicia from the 
ground. 

“ Leetchy,” said Doctor Geddes, “ if you ever 
take back what you ’ve said I shall be sorry I 
was n’t killed. But I don’t mind staying alive if 
you’ll keep on loving me. If I stay alive, will 
you marry me, Leetchy? ” 

“ If you don’t, I can’t m-m-marry any-anybody 
at all ! ” wailed Alicia. 

“Amen!” said the doctor. “Now stop cry- 
ing, and put your hand into my pocket, and 
you ’ll find something that ’s been owing you this 
long time, Leetchy.” 

Alicia blinked, and rubbed her eyes, then 
slipped her hand into his breast pocket and drew 
forth a small, square, satin-lined box; an invit- 
ing box. 

“Richard!” she exclaimed, “why, Richard!” 
Then: “Of all the impudence!” cried Alicia, 
scandalized. “ Why, you have n’t even a^sked 
me! Whoever in this world heard of buying a 
girl’s ring before she ’s said ‘ Yes ’? ” 

“ Alicia,” said Doctor Richard Geddes, “ I 'm 
your Man, and you know it. And you ’re my 
Girl, and I know it. Here, let ’s see if this thing 
fits.” 

Meekly Alicia, the impudent, the flirt, held out 
her slim hand. 

“ That ’s settled, thank God ! ” said the doctor. 


THE GREATEST GIFT 335 

And he swept her clear off her feet, and kissed 
her with thoroughness -and enthusiasm. 

“ Richard ! People are coming ! They ’ll see 
you ! ” 

“ Let ’em ! ” 

I sat there quietly, and stared at the two of 
them with a sort of vacant watchfulness. My 
hat was gone, my hairpins had taken unto them- 
selves wings, and my hair, covered with dust, 
hung about me like a veil. I was just beginning 
to be conscious of pain. It was a shuddering 
pain, new and cruel, and I winced. The next 
minute Alicia was kneeling beside me, and her 
face had again become quite colorless. 

“ Sophy ! ” her voice sounded shrill and far 
off. “ Sophy, you said you w r ere all right ! — 
Richard, look at Sophy ! ” 

I felt the doctor's swift, deft hands upon me. 
And more pain. People were arriving now. 
Cars stopped, and excited men and women sur- 
rounded us. One tall figure leaped from the first 
car and reached us ahead of all others. 

“ Geddes ! ” cried a voice. “ Thank God, 
Geddes ! We w^ere told you ’d been killed out- 
right! Alicia all right, too?” Then: “ Sophy!” 
This time it w r as a cry of terror. “ Never tell 
me it ’s Sophy ! ” 

I sav r his face bent over me. Then a red mist 
came, and then everything w r ent dark. 


CHAPTER XIX 


DEEP WATERS 

S OMEWHERE, far, far off, a faint and feeble 
little light glimmered, one small point of 
light in vast blackness. In the whole universe 
there was n’t anything or anybody but just that 
tiny light, and swift black water, and drowning 
me. Something deep within me — I think oc- 
cultists call it the body-spirit — was clamoring 
frantically to hold fast to the light, because if 
that went under I should go under, too. I tried 
to keep my eyes- upon the trembling spark. 
Whereupon the light changed to a sound, the 
monotonous insistence of which forced me to 
be worriedly aware of it. It was — why, it was 
a voice, calling, over and over and over again, 
“ Sophy! Sophy! ” 

Somebody was calling me. With an immense 
effort I managed to raise my eyelids. I was 
lying in a bed, and caught a drowsy, fleeting 
glimpse of four posts. 

Four posts upon my bed, 

Four angels for my head, 

Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John 
Bless the bed that I lie on ! 

336 


DEEP WATERS 


337 


Granny used to say that for me at night ; only 
she had said “ four hangels for my ’ead,” at 
which I used to giggle into my pillows. I had n’t 
felt so close to Granny since I was little Sophy, 
in the rooms over our shop in Boston. She was 
somewhere around me; if I went to sleep now, 
she ’d be there when I woke up in the morning. 
But the sound that was a calling voice would n’t 
let me go to sleep. Slowly, heavily, I managed 
to get my eyes open again. 

“ Look at me ! ” said the voice imperiously. 
Two large dark eyes caught my wavering glance 
and held it, as in a vise. “ Sophy ! Sophy ! I 
need you ” 

Said another voice, then, brokenly : “ For 

mercy’s sake, J elnik, let her go in peace ! ” 

“ N o, she sha’n’t die. I won’t have it ! — 
Sophy, come back ! It is I who call you, Sophy. 
Come back ! ” 

My stiff lips moved. “ Must go — sleep,” I 
tried to say. 

“No,” I forbid you to go to sleep, Sophy!” 
His dark eyes, full of life and compelling power, 
held my tired and dimmed ones, his firm, warm 
hands held my cold and inert fingers. “ My love, 
my dear love, stay. You have got to stay, Sophy. 
Don’t you understand? You can’t go, Sophy! ” 

My dulled brain stumblingly laid hold upon a 
thought: Nicholas J elnik was calling me. He 


338 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


was calling me because he loved me. One sim- 
ply can ? t go down into sleep and darkness, when 
a miracle like that is climbing like the morning- 
star into one’s skies. 

“ Stay ! ” he said, his lips against my ear. 
“ Sophy ! My love, my dear love, stay ! 99 

But although he held me close, I could feel 
myself being drawn away. There must have 
been that in my straining glance that made 
him aware, for of a sudden he cried out, lifted 
me bodily in his arms, and kissed me on the 
mouth. 

My heart quite stopped beating, as a spent 
runner pauses, that he may gather new strength 
to go on. With a sigh I fell back; but not into 
the water and the dark. 

“ By God, you ’ve pulled her through, Jel- 
nik ! ” cried the voice of Richard Geddes. 

Came vague sounds, stirs, movements, hands 
upon me. Then oblivion again. 

I woke up one pleasant forenoon to find a brisk 
and capable young woman in white sitting in 
my room, her head bent over the piece of linen 
she was hemming. She was a healthy, hand- 
some young woman, with hard, firm cheeks, hard, 
firm lips, and professional eyes and glasses. 
She glanced Tip and met my wan stare. 

“ What are you doing here, if you please? ” 
I asked politely. 


BEEP WATERS 339 

“ I have been nursing you, Miss Smith. You 
have been quite ill, you know.” 

I lay there looking at that self-contained, 
trained young woman, with feelings of almost 
ludicrous astonishment. I remembered the skid- 
ding car; and Richard Geddes lying with his 
head on Alicia’s knees, and how we had both 
thought him dead ; and myself sitting in the dust; 
and then the pain. But it was astounding news 
that I had been very badly hurt full three weeks 
ago! 

Alicia stole in and, seeing me awake, tried to 
smile, but cried instead, with a wet cheek against 
my hand. A few minutes later Doctor Geddes 
himself appeared. It was enough to scandalize 
any self-contained nurse to see a six-foot-three 
doctor behave in the most abandoned and un- 
bedside manner! 

“ Sophy ! ” gulped the doctor, “ oh, deuce take 
you, Sophronisba Two, what do you mean 
by scaring honest folks half out of their 
wits? ” 

The nurse was destined to receive another 
shock. Richard of the Lion Heart dropped down 
on his knees beside Alicia, and laid his bearded 
cheek against my wan one, and for a while 
could n’t speak. Alicia tried to get her slender 
arms around him, and couldn’t. 

“ I think,” ventured the nurse, in level tones, 


340 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


“ that the patient had better not be excited. 
Shall I give her a stimulant, doctor? ” 

“ The patient ’s on the highroad to getting 
well/- said the doctor. “ And we ’re the best of 
all stimulants, are n’t we, Sophy? ” 

When I began to get stronger, the dream which 
had haunted my illness came back with aston- 
ishing vividness and haunted my waking hours. 
I knew it was a dream, for of course I had n’t 
been in black water, I had n’t strained toward a 
light upon the flood, and of course, I had n’t 
really heard Nicholas Jelnik calling my name; 
and the kiss was part of the fantasy. I watched 
him stealthily, this cool, collected, impersonal 
young man, to whom even the efficient nurse was 
astonishingly respectful, and pure laughter 
seized me at the idea of his crying aloud, being as 
agitated, as passionate, as fiercely insistent, as 
he had been in the vision. 

I ventured to put a part of the vagary to the 
acid test : 

“ Alicia, I was n’t thrown out again, into 
water, was I? ” 

“ No. That was delirium, dear. You were 
frightfully ill for a while, Sophy.” Her face 
paled. “ So ill that The Author fled, because he 
would n’t stay in the house and see — what we 
expected to see. He said it would permanently 


DEEP WATERS 341 

shatter his nerves. But he has wired every day 
since.” 

“ It was sensible of him to go. And it ’s kind 
of him to wire.” I said no more about the water. 

“ Everybody has been kind. And it wasn’t 
duty kindness, either. It was kind kindness ! ” 
said Alicia, lucidly. “ Do you know what 
they’re saying in Hyndsville now? They’re 
saying old Sophronisba played a joke on herself.” 
She left me to digest that as ‘best I might. 

It is n’t pleasant to be ill anywhere. But it 
is n’t altogether unpleasant to be on the sick list 
in South Carolina. Everybody is anxious about 
you. Old ladies with palm-leaf fans in their tire- 
less hands come and sit with you. They are n’t 
brilliant old ladies, you understand. I know 
some whose secular library consists of the Com- 
plete Works of John Esten Cooke, Gilmore 
Simms’s War Poems of the South, and a thumbed 
copy of Father Ryan. But add to these the 
Bible, the Book of Common Prayer, and the Imi- 
tation of Christ, and it does n’t make such a bad 
showing. It ’s astonishing how soothing the 
companionship of women fed upon this pabulum 
can be, when the things of the world are of neces- 
sity set aside for a space, and the simpler things 
of the spirit draw near. 

Old gentlemen in well-brushed clothes and im- 


342 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


maculate, exquisitely darned linen, call daily 
with small gifts of fruit and flowers, and send 
you messages from which you infer that the sun 
won’t be able to shine properly until you come 
outside again. And there is n’t a housekeeper 
of your acquaintance who has n’t got you on her 
mind: there are sent to you steaming bowls of 
perfect soup, flaky rolls and golden cake, jeweled 
jellies, and cool, enticing, trembly things in glass 
dishes. And when you can sit up for more than 
an hour or two at a time, why, then you know 
wdiat it really means to have South Carolina 
neighbors. 

Doctor Geddes made me spend my days in the 
garden that Schmetz had labored upon with such 
loving-kindness, and that in consequence was 
become a marvel of bloom and scent. Every but- 
terfly in South Carolina must have visited that 
garden. I had n’t known there were that many 
butterflies in the world. All the florist-shop 
windows in New York, that I had once paused 
before with envy and longing, were stinted and 
poor and pale before the living, out-o’-doors won- 
der of it. Florist shops have n’t any bees, nor 
birds, nor butterflies, nor trees that wave their 
green branches at you like friendly hands. 

A flowering vine festooned the marble Love, 
and one great scarlet spray of bloom flamed upon 
his marble torch, “ so lyrically,” Miss Martha 


DEEP WATERS 


343 


Hopkins said, that she was moved to write a 
poem about it. L thought it a very nice poem, 
and I said so, when she read it to us. But Doc- 
tor Geddes, who doesn't care for poetry, except 
Robert Burns’s, rujbbed his nose. 

“ Oh, well, your grandmother and your aunts 
used to make antimacassars and wall-pockets and 
paper flowers,” he ruminated. “ Why should n’t 
you make poetry if you feel like it? ” 

“ You are to be pitied, Richard,” said Miss 
Martha, with crushing charity. “ Such a dis- 
position ! And the older you grow the worse it 
gets.” 

“ Confound it, Martha ! — ” 

“ I do,” said she. 

Alicia looked at Richard with impersonal eyes. 
She looked at the ruffled center of culture. 

“ Don’t pay any attention to him, Miss Mar- 
tha,” she said, with a charming smile. “ Your 
poem is very pretty, and he knows it.” 

“ He means well,” said Miss Martha, resign- 
edly. 

“Now, you look here, Martha!” the doctor 
said angrily, “ I won’t have anybody telling me 
to my face I mean well. You might as well call 
me a fool outright.” 

“ You are far from being a fool, Richard. 
And you do mean well. Everybody knows 
that.” 


344 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


He turned appealingly to liis dear Leetchy, and 
received his first lesson in Domestic Science. 

“ Miss Martha is right, Richard,” she decided. 

“ Leetchy,” the doctor asked, when the mollified 
Miss Hopkins had departed, “ why did Martha 
go off grinning? ” 

“How should I know?” wondered Alicia, in- 
nocently. Then she looked at him with Irish 
eyes : “ Have you had your lunch, dear? ” she 

asked. 

“ Lunch? ” He looked bewildered. 

“ Because I ’m going to fix Sophy’s lunch now, 
and you may have yours with her, if you like. 
I love to wait on you, Richard,” she added, and 
a beautiful color flooded her face. 

He caught his breath. When she went back 
to the house, his eyes followed her adoringly. 

“ Sophy,” he said, huskily, “ what does she see 
in me? Do you think I ’m good enough for her, 
Sophy? ” 

“ I think you are quite good enough even for 
Alicia.” 

When he had gone, Alicia sat with her head 
against my knees. Of late a touching gravity, 
a sweet seriousness, had settled upon her. 
Her love for the big doctor was singularly 
clear-eyed and far-seeing. There were going to 
be times when every ounce of skill, tact, patience, 
love itself, would be called upon, for the reins 


DEEP WATERS 


345 


must be gossamer-light, invisible, but always firm 
and sure, that should guide and tone down so 
impatient and fiery a nature as his. It was 
very easy to love him ; it was n’t always going to 
be easy to live with him, and Alicia knew it. 
But she also knew, with a faith beyond all fail- 
ing, that this was her high, destined, heaven- 
ordained job. 

“ Sophy darlin’, I ’m deplorably young, am I 
not? ” she sighed. 

“ You ’ll get over it.” 

“ Do you think I ’ll make him a good wife, 
Sophy? ” 

“ I am absolutely certain,” I said, “ that you ’ll 
make him a good husband. Which is far more 
important.” 

Alicia hugged my knees, and laughed. Then, 
seeing Mr. Nicholas Jelnik approaching, she 
scrambled to her feet, picked up the tray of 
empty dishes, and went back to the house. 

Neither she nor the doctor had asked me so 
much as one question about Mr. Jelnik. As if 
by tacit understanding that subject was avoided. 
And because I had n’t anything to tell them, I, 
too, held my peace. 

He raised my hand to his lips, dropped into 
a chair, and bared his forehead to the soft 
wind. 

“ How good that feels ! ” he sighed. “ Frau- 


346 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


lein, may one smoke? ” And receiving permis- 
sion he smoked for a while, comfortably, lean- 
ing back with half-closed eyes. 

“ Achmet salaams to you, hanoum ” he said 
presently. “ You have won his heart of a true 
believer. Even Daoud demands daily news of 
you.” 

“ I particularly like The Jinnee. I should 
like to have him around me. And Daoud is 
highly ornamental.” 

“ When is The Author coming back? Or is 
he coming back? ” he asked abruptly. 

“ Oh, yes. He will be here for the wedding. 
So will Miss Emmeline.” 

After a long pause, and with an evident ef- 
fort: 

“ I have been thinking,” he said, “ that per- 
haps it was unfortunate I came between you and 
The Author. Perhaps,” he added deliberately, 
“ it would have been better had you let your com- 
mon sense gain the day.” 

I don’t know why, but just at that moment the 
dear and haunting dream of having been lifted 
out of deep waters and kissed back to life, cradled 
in this man’s arms, came to me with peculiar 
poignancy. Of a sudden I laughed aloud. 

“ Oh, I ’in just remembering a dream I had, 
when I was ill,” I told him, in answer to his 
look of surprise. 


DEEP WATERS 


347 


“ It must have been a very amusing dream,” 
said he, staring at me thoughtfully. 

“ Oh, very ! Quite absurd. But go on. You 
were by way of advising me to marry The Author, 
were you not? ” 

His hands on the arms of the wicker chair 
clenched. He half rose, thought better of it, and 
sank back. 

“ I was saying that it might have been better 
for you,” he said, breathing quickly. “ In all 
probability you would have accepted him, had I 
not been here to — blunder into the affair.” 

“ He might n’t have asked me, if you had n’t 
been here to blunder into the affair,” said I, com- 
posedly. “ Let us drop the subject, please. I 
shall never marry The Author.” It gave me a 
sense of relief and freedom to hear myself say 
that. “ I can’t marry The Author.” 

He went pale. “ Sophy — you can’t marry me, 
either,” he said. 

“ Of course not.” I wondered at myself for 
being so calm and collected. “ I knew that all 
along. You care for another woman. You told 
me so, you know.” 

“ I told you no such thing,” he said. “ I told 
you I cared for a woman, bu.t that there was an- 
other man. Now I ’ve just been told she has no 
idea of accepting the other man. In spite of all 
he has to offer, she is n’t going to marry him.” 


348 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


His face was at once ecstatic and tortured. 
“ Why won’t you marry the other man, Sophy? ” 

“ Because of a dream I dreamed, when I was 
sick,” I said noncommittally. 

“Ah! And did you dream that somebody 
called you — and held you — and wouldn't let 
you go? ” 

“ I never told you ! ” I cried. 

“ No need, Sophy. It was to me you came 
back.” Of a sudden his head drooped. “ And 
now I can’t marry you ! ” 

“ Why can’t you? ” 

“ Because I ’m a beggar.” 

Nicholas Jelnik a beggar couldn’t find lodg- 
ment in my brain. I could only stare at him 
incredulously. 

“ I learned some time ago that things were 
not altogether right over yonder, but I hadn’t 
the ghost of an idea that my entire estate was 
involved ; that while I ’d been ‘ tramping ’ — I ’ll 
use Judge Gatchell's word — the men in whose 
hands I placed too much power had taken advan- 
tage of it. A very common, every-day story, you 
see. 

“ Kemains the fact that I ’m stripped to the 
bone. The estate ’s wiped out. And,” he added, 
with a grave smile, “ I have n’t even discovered 
the mythical Hynds jewels. Now you see, 
Sophy, why I can’t marry you.” 


BEEP WATERS 


349 


u I see why you think you can’t.” 

He flushed to the roots of his black hair. 
Hynds-Jelnik pride rose in arms. 

u I should cut rather a sorry figure marrying 
the owner of Hynds House, in the present circum- 
stances,” he said curtly. “ You will remember 
that The Author called me an adventurer! I 
have told you I have nothing.” 

“ Are n’t you forgetting your profession? ” 

“ No. But I neglected that, too, Sophy. The 
Wanderlust had me in its grip.” 

“ What do you propose to do? ” 

“ I shall leave here, put in some months of hard 
study, and then fight my way upward. My fa- 
ther was the greatest alienist of his generation, 
and I was trained under his eye. But in the 
meantime — ” 

“ Yes. In the meantime, what of met ” I 
asked. 

He winced as if he had been struck. “ You 
are free,” he said, in a whisper. 

“ I am free to be free, and you ’re free to set me 
free. You never asked me to marry you, in the 
first place,” I agreed quietly. 

Stupefaction seized him. He put his hands to 
his head. 

“ Why, Sophy ! Why, Sophy ! ” he stammered. 
Of a sudden he straightened his shoulders, and 
stood erect : “ Miss Smith,” he said, with grave 


350 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


politeness, “ will you do me the honor to marry 
me? ” and he waited. 

“ It is rather a belated request, Mr. J elnik. 
Besides, you have n’t told me why you want to 
marry me,” said I, sedately. 

“ You are well aware that I love you, Sophy. 
And I think you care for me in return. Why did 
you turn that coin when it meant ‘ Go,’ and bid 
me, instead, ‘ Stay ’? Was it because you cared, 
Sophy? ” 

“ Yes, Mr. Jelnik: it was because I cared. I 
cared enough to tell a — a lie. And — I shall 
say yes to your other question, Mr. Jelnik.” 

But he shook his head. “ Ah, no, my dear ! 
You ’d be called upon to make too many sacri- 
fices. I could n’t bear that ! ” 

“ A man need n’t be worried about the sacri- 
fices a woman makes for him when she knows he 
loves her.” 

“Not in normal circumstances; not when he 
can give as much as he takes.” 

“ Hynds House,” I said, “ is costing me a steep 
and bitter price, Mr. Jelnik ! ” 

“ Do I not also pay? ” he asked fiercely. 

“ Oh, you have your pride ! ” said I, wearily ; 
“ Hynds pride ! ” 

“ A poor enough possession, Sophy, but all that 
remains to me,” he said gently. “ Is it a light 


DEEP WATERS 


351 


thing for Nicholas Jelnik to say to the woman he 
loves, ‘I cannot marry you: I am a beggar ’? 
Is it such a small sacrifice to give you up, 
Sophy? ” 

“ It would appear so.” 

“ You crucify me ! ” he said, in a choking voice. 
“ Good God, don’t you understand that I love 
you? ” 

“ I don’t understand anything, except that you 
are going away from me. And I have waited for 
you all my life,” I said. 

“ And I for you ! and I for you ! ” he said pas- 
sionately. “ Don’t make it too hard for me, 
Sophy!” 

“ If you go away from me,” I gasped, “ I think 
I shall die. Nicholas — I can’t bear it! It was 
easier for me when I thought you loved somebody 
else. But now that I know you love me” and I 
paused. 

He took a step forward, but stopped. His 
arms fell to his sides. 

“ Not as a beggar ! ” he said. “ Not as a beg- 
gar! Never that, for Nicholas Jelnik! I love 
you too much for that, Sophy. I love you not 
only for yourself, but for my own best self, too, 
my dearest.” 

For a moment he stood there, regarding me 
fixedly. It was a long look, of suffering, of love, 


352 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


of pride, of unyielding resolve. Then he lifted 
my hand to his lips, bowed, and left me. 

I sat staring over the garden. I wondered if, 
somewhere on the other side of things, Great- 
Aunt Sophronisba was n’t snickering. 


CHAPTER XX 


HARBOR 

M Y faith, but I ’m glad you ’re entirely well 
again, Sophy ! ” wrote The Author, in his 
small, fine, hypercritical script. “ You make the 
world a pleasanter place by being alive in it. 
People like you should inculcate in themselves 
the fixed and unalterable habit of being alive. 
They should firmly refuse to be anything else. I 
call this to your attention, in the hope that you 
will see your bounden duty and do it. 

“ When I thought you were going to quit, I ran 
away. That was a calamity I could not stand by 
and witness, without disaster. However, Jelnik 
stayed ! 

“Your nurse (I do not like Miss Ransome, 
though I respect, admire, and fear her. Her 
emotions are carbolized, her heart is sterilized, 
her personality has the mathematical perfection 
of something turned out by a super-machine : like, 
say, the last word in machine-guns. None of the 
divine imperfection of your hand-wrought, artist- 
stuff there! I forgive her for existing, because 
353 


354 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


she is intelligent and useful, two things that, 
without lying like a Christian and a gentleman, 
one may not say of many women, and seldom of 
one woman at the same time), your nurse gave 
me a highly interesting, impersonal, scientific 
account of what happened after my flight. Her 
testimony was all the more valuable in that she 
was, as she said, only ‘ psychologically inter- 
ested/ She reminded me that Empedocles is 
said to have recalled a young woman from death 
by the same means, i. e., the insistent repetition 
of her name ; which proved to Miss Ransome that 
the poor old ancients had ‘ anticipated, though of 
course unscientifically, some of the principles of 
modern psychology/ Eheu! 

“ It proved something else to me, Sophy — that 
I had too willingly underestimated Mr. Nicholas 
J elnik. There is very much more to that young 
man than I like to admit. 

“ He would have made such a perfect villain : 
I could have made a work of art of him, as a 
villain! And now I can’t, because he isn’t. 
This chagrins me. It upsets my notions of the 
fitness of things. More yet : he loves you, Sophy, 
more than I do, or ever could. 

“Does this astound you? Come and let us 
reason together : the spirit moves me to speak out 
in meeting. 

“You are the only woman I have ever been 


HARBOR 


355 


willing to marry. That I should wish to marry 
you astonished me far, far more than it did you. 
At the same time it delighted me by its very unex- 
pectedness. It gave me a brand-new emotion, 
and brand-new emotions are n’t every-day affairs, 
let me tell you ! You brought something naive, 
unusual, fresh, perplexing, into a bored existence. 
And then you refused to spoil it! That added 
to the quality of the unusualness. The ninety 
and nine would have subjected me to the acid test 
of matrimony, with the later and inevitable ali- 
mony. The saving hundredth sees to it that I 
shall keep my illusions ! O rare dear wise 
Sophy! How shall I repay you? 

“ For I shall be able to indulge in day-dreams 
now. I shall not grow old cynically. There are 
unselfish, true-hearted, valiant women. There 
are women who will not marry men for posi- 
tion, name, fame, power, money ; no, nor for any- 
thing but love. How do I know? Because you 
don’t love me, my dear. But you do love Nich- 
olas Jelnik. You had not come back from the 
gates of death else, Sophy. 

“ Marry him. You will bring him the quiet 
strength and sureness he needs. A temperamen- 
tal man, a finely organized, highly gifted, sensi- 
tive, and intellectual man needs just such affec- 
tion as yours, as unshakable as the sun, as faith- 
ful as the fixed stars. That you should love him 


356 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


almost makes me believe in the direct interven- 
tion of divine Providence in his behalf. My own 
innate and troublesome decency forces me to add 
that he is worth it. He has altogether too much, 
confound him ! 

“ Do you know that while you lay ill, he came 
and told me about the finding of Jessamine 
Hynds, showed me her statement, told me, in 
short, the whole story? I was consumed with 
envy, malice, and all uncharitableness; to think 
that such a thing should or could happen right 
under my nose, and I all unwitting! And you, 
too, Sophy, went through such an experience! 
I ’d give a year of my life to have been with you. 

“ When Jelnik had finished, and I ’d caught 
my breath, I apologized for having been a dam’ 
nuisance. He explained, delicately, soothingly, 
with exquisite politeness, that literary folks of 
consequence have to be dam’ nuisances at times. 
It ’s the price they pay. 

“ And now let me speak to you, my little Sophy, 
as your loving and loyal friend: Hold fast to 
Jelnik . I knew his father. The position he oc- 
cupied was n’t exactly royal, but the elect ad- 
dressed him as ‘ thou.’ And you have learned 
somewhat of the Hyndses. In consequence, your 
Jelnik is a mixture of South-Carolina-Viennese- 
Hynds- Jelnik pride, beside which Satan’s is as 
mild, meek, and innocuous as a properly raised 


HARBOR 


357 


Anglican curate. Don’t meet his pride with 
pride. Meet it with you , Sophy. Most of us 
have been loved in our time, but how few of us 
have been permitted really to love! That you 
have in full measure this heavenliest of all pow- 
ers, is your hope and his. 

“ There are times I ’m almost sorry you did n’t 
love me, Sophy. I should then have passed my 
days in a state of pleasant bewilderment, trying 
to figure out how the deuce it happened. Or 
should I, though? H’m! I might have gotten 
used to being married to you, and that would 
have spelled boredom. The thought makes me 
shudder. 

“ Johnson and I are coming down for Leetchy’s 
wedding, of course. That pink-and-white piece 
of Irishry will rule Geddes to perfection. 
There ’s the steel under the velvet, the cat’s claws 
under that satin paw of hers — more power to it ! 
I have two prints and a piece of Cloisonn6 for 
her that I am sorely tempted to keep for myself. 
I have more than once bought things to give to 
friends, and then found myself unable to do so. 
I should n’t be able to give these to anybody but 
one of the ladies of Hynds House. 

“ Johnson mopes. The youngest Meade girl, 
she with the dimples, the pink cheeks, the fluffy 
hair, and the fluffier brains, is the cause. He 
sighs for everything and everybody. For Mary 


358 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


Magdalen’s batter cakes. For the Black family. 
For the Kissing Cow, and for Beautiful Dog. 
Hynds House is a fatal place ! 

“ So we are coming back to it, as soon as we 
may. I kiss your hand, Madame, and beg you to 
understand that so long as we two live you are 
never going to be able, for any considerable 
length of time, to get rid of, 

Your affectionate friend, 

The Author.” 

I was able to read between the lines, and my 
heart warmed to The Author. At the same time 
the letter saddened me, in so far as it referred to 
Mr. Jelnik. 

Refuse to let him go? But I could n’t keep 
him. I knew now that he had to go, that it was 
the best thing, the only thing. Doctor Geddes 
helped me to see that. The doctor tried, at first, 
to keep his cousin in Hyndsville. Why should n’t 
Nicholas go into partnership with him? Why 
shouldn’t Nicholas share everything the open- 
hearted, open-handed doctor had? 

Mr. Jelnik smiled, thanked him, and put the 
offer by. And I knew he was right. 

It had been a rainy day and was now one of 
those afternoons that have the rawness of au- 
tumn, though summer is still present. It was 


HARBOR 


359 


so chilly that a fire burned in the library fire- 
place, before which I was sitting. The wind was 
from the northeast, and the trees and bushes 
slanted before it. Potty Black and I had the 
library all to our alone-selves, for Alicia was 
spending the day with Mary Meade, one of her 
bridesmaids. 

The wedding was less than six weeks off, 
and preparations were under way. It was to be 
a home wedding, the first to take place in Hynds 
House since Richard’s day, and somehow that 
lent the occasion the rose color of romance. It 
was thus a part of Hynds House history, some- 
thing Hyndsville could n’t take lightly. Alicia’s 
w T edding was a town affair, in which everybody 
was delightfully interested. 

Besides, the bridegroom himself was, a Hynds 
on his mother’s side, as Hyndsville ladies re- 
membered, when they sat on our front porch 
working on wonderful bits of embroidered things 
for the bride. It was then I learned in full- 
est detail the whole history of Hyndsville, of the 
Hyndses, and of Great-Aunt Sophronisba in par- 
ticular. I fancy that the Witch of Endor’s 
neighbors must have had just such an opinion of 
her as these Hyndsville folk had of Great-Aunt 
Sophronisba. 

South Carolina people always talk in terms 
of three generations. When they say something 


360 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


about you, they remember something about your 
mother or your grandfather at the same time, 
and they tell that, too. There is a fearsome 
frankness about the conversation of the born 
South Carolinian that The Author says is only to 
be matched in an English country house when 
the county families are gathered together. Like 
this, for instance: 

“ No, my dear, I can’t say I ’m surprised at 
Sally’s running away and getting married. 
Let ’s see : her grandfather was a Dampier, 
was n’t he? Did n’t one of the Dampiers mur- 
der somebody, or something like that? It seems 
to me I have heard dear Mama relate some such 
circumstance.” 

“ Oh, no , Mary ! It was n’t murder ! He shot 
one of the Abercrombies in a duel, that ’s all. 
He was really a very fine man ! They had a dis- 
pute about a horse, and Mr. Abercrombie struck 
Mr. Dampier’s little negro groom over the head 
with his crop. After that, of course, there 
was nothing to do but challenge him. You must 
be thinking of Barton Bailey, Eliza DuFour’s 
grandfather on her mother’s side. He was a 
complete scoundrel. His poor wife (she was a 
Garrett; very dull, poor thing, like all the Gar- 
retts, but at least the Garretts were honest, which 
is more than even charity can say for the 
Baileys) his wife led a martyr’s life with him. 


HARBOR 


361 


Or maybe you ’re thinking of Tiger Bill Pen- 
darvis. A most awful person ! — almost an out- 
law ! ” 

Mrs. Scar boro looked up, bit off a thread, and 
said placidly: 

“ Oh, awful ! He was a cousin of mine on dear 
Papa’s side of the family. Papa and Mama used 
to say that they never could understand why 
Cousin Sophronisba Hynds did n’t pick out Tiger 
Bill instead of pouncing upon a perfectly inno- 
cent little Englishman.” 

I sat and listened. One thing was joyously 
clear and plain to me. They liked and trusted 
me enough now to talk about their own people 
before me, which is the high sign of fellowship 
in South Carolina. But learn, O outsider, that 
silence is golden, so far as you are concerned. 
Wisely did I hold my peace, and devoutly 
thank the Lord that times had changed for the 
better. 

For a great deal of that change I had to thank 
my dear girl, so much more clever and tactful 
than I. And so I would not cloud her last days 
with me by letting her see that I was unhappy. 
Only, I was glad this afternoon to be by myself 
for a breathing-space. It rests one’s face occa- 
sionally to take off one’s smile. I took off mine, 
then, and let down the corners of my mouth. 

The door leading to the hall was half open. 


362 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


The house was full of blue-gray shadows, and 
had a drowsy hush upon it, a pleasanter hush 
than it used to know. One heard the rushing 
wind outside, and above it Mary Magdalen sing- 
ing one of her interminable “ speretuals.” 

A slinking shadow stole through the hall, a 
wary yellow head appeared in the door, and 
Beautiful Dog sneaked into the room. Beauti- 
ful Dog had not known a happy day since the 
departure of Mr. Johnson. Not all the coddlings 
of the cook, nor the blandishments of sympa- 
thetic housemaids consoled him for the absence 
of his god. He grew thinner, if that could be 
possible. His tail hung at half-mast, his ears 
were a signal of mourning. Queenasheeba said 
he looked like “ sumpin’ ’at happened to a dawg.” 

One hope sustained Beautiful Dog’s drooping 
spirit — the hope that he might suddenly turn a 
corner, or enter a room, and find the adored 
Johnson smiling kindly at him. Wherefore he 
dared the to-be-shunned presence of other white 
people. He nerved himself to enter tabooed do- 
mains. Love sustained him. He knew he had 
no business there, just as our cats knew it and, 
whenever they caught him at it, visited swift 
and dire punishment upon him. Beautiful Dog 
dared even the cats, those black nightmares of 
his existence. 

He met my glance, paused, and cringed. But 


HARBOR 


363 


as I made no hostile movement, and seemed dis- 
posed to be friendly, Beautiful Dog grinned half- 
heartedly, wagged his rope of a tail dejectedly, 
and advanced farther. Then he paused again, 
head on one side, ears forlornly flopping, and 
made an awkward motion with his fore paws, 
expressive of doubtful trust and painful inquiry. 
His god had been wont to choose this particular 
room by preference. Did I know where he was? 
When he was coming back? 

Beautiful Dog glanced wistfully at the empty 
chair over by the window. Once or twice his 
god had allowed him to lie beside that chair 
while he read, and if Beautiful Dog happened to 
raise his head, a kind hand happened to fall upon 
it. He had n’t forgotten. His desire now was 
to sneak over to the chair and sniff at it. Per- 
haps by some exquisite miracle his man might 
suddenly appear in his old place. Can’t miracles 
happen for Beautiful Dogs as well as for other 
folks, when times and seasons are propitious? 

Beautiful Dog took another step toward the 
chair. And then there paced into the library, 
and caught him in the rear, his arch enemy — 
Sir Thomas More Black. The great cat took 
one look at the nigger dog trespassing upon for- 
bidden ground. You could see Sir Thomas More 
swell with rage and astonishment, and then 
lengthen out like an accordion. Without a 


364 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


sound he launched himself upon the intruder. 
And at the same instant and actuated by the 
same motive, Potty Black, who had been sweetly 
and peacefully dozing on my lap, rose up with 
slitted ej'es, bottle-brushed her tail, and hurled 
herself into the fray. 

Attacked front and rear, Beautiful Dog was 
at hideous disadvantage. He launched himself 
sidewise ; he did n’t even have time to howl. He 
fell over his own splay feet as he ran, butted into 
chairs and tables, twisted, turned, whirled, 
dodged, but always presented just the right spot 
to be clawed. He could n't dash to the door and 
escape: the cats were too swift for him. They 
kept their bewildered victim circling around the 
middle of the room. 

I was sorry for Beautiful Dog, for my sleek, 
petted, purring pussies had turned into raging 
black tornadoes edged with a lightning of claws. 
If the aristocratic Black Family had been raised 
in Hooligan’s Alley itself, on the soft side of the 
ash-bins, they could n’t have behaved more vil- 
lainously. Alas! they were cats , just as people 
are people. 

I snatched up the brass-headed poker, the read- 
iest thing to my hand. I merely wished to shoo 
off the Blacks with it. But as I rose from my 
chair with a scat! upon my lips, Beautiful Dog, 
seeing out of the tail of his eye a chance to escape, 


HARBOR 


365 


dashed headlong into me. He came with such 
force that I fell backward, and the poker flew 
out of my hand and came crack! upon the sacred 
tiles of Hynds House library. There was an 
ominous clatter, for no* less than the Father of 
his Country himself had fallen out of his place. 
At the same instant Beautiful Dog gained the 
door, with both cats upon his hind quarters; 
with one prolonged yell of terror he made for 
safety and Mary Magdalen. 

I picked myself and the tile up. Thank 
Heaven, it wasn’t broken. The blow had loos- 
ened the cement that held it in place, and where 
it had been was a small square hole. 

I looked at that hole doubtfully. There 
ought n’t to be any hole there at all. That was 
a curious way to fix tiles, such precious tiles 
as ours. I slipped my hand in and tentatively 
tested the black wall, and discovered that the 
other tiles, as might be expected, had been prop- 
erly put in ; that is, against a solid background. 

I put my hand farther into the aperture. It 
was larger than might be expected, and most 
cunningly contrived — a hollow space some ten 
inches in width, and possibly a foot deep. There 
was something in it. 

Now I am mortally afraid of rats and mice, 
and what I had touched had the sleazy feel of 
frayed silk. It might be a rat’s nest! I took 


366 A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


a sliver of lightwood from the fire, and with this 
examined the black interior, before I ventured 
my fingers again. It was n’t a rat’s nest in the 
corner. It was a package. A package, or rather 
a sizable buckskin bag carefully tied together 
with thongs of the same material, and this 
wrapped in a piece of silk that tore and went to 
pieces even as I fingered it. 

Even then I did n’t guess ! I thought it was, 
perhaps, a Revolutionary hoard, maybe such an- 
other collection of old coins as we had found in 
the room without windows. 

The silk dropped away like rotting leaves, but 
the buckskin bag was stout and in perfect con- 
dition. So many and so hard were the knots in 
the thongs that I had to use my penknife to cut 
them. And having done so, I poured the con- 
tents of the bag on the library table. 

It was, as I have said, a gray day. But the 
fires of a century’s sunsets flamed and flashed 
in that library ! Ruby, sapphire, diamond, 
emerald, pearl — how they glowed and glim- 
mered! How they shone and sparkled! For 
the moment there fell upon me that madness that 
jewels bring upon women, a sort of wild delight 
in their hard, bright beauty, an ecstasy, an in- 
toxication. I poured them from one hand to the 
other, I held the greatest to my cheek. The 
loveliness of them went to my head. “ I did clia^r 


HARBOR 


367 


them atween my hands, as children chap chaff. 
They did glow like the Devill his rainbow,” Jes- 
samine had said. And remembering her, the de- 
light vanished. 

With stunning force the meaning of this dis- 
covery came home to me. I had found the un- 
lindable ! This, this was where Shooba had hid- 
den them between a night and a morning, Shooba 
the “ skilfullest workman on Hynds place.” One 
fancied him here, in the dead of night, while all 
Hynds House slept a drugged sleep. It would 
suit his sardonic humor, his impish malice, to 
hide them where the Hyndses must pass them 
daily; and, himself a slave, to hide them behind 
the pictured semblance of Washington. The 
grim irony of the thing! And not the cunning 
of man, but the antics of a cur, a yellow nigger 
dog, had outwitted the cunning of the old witch 
doctor! Beautiful Dog had brought to light 
that which Jessamine had died alone in the dark 
rather than reveal. 

There was one thing more in the buckskin bag, 
wrapped separately. When I got this separate 
package open, I found three frayed, black fea- 
thers bound together with a strand of black hair, 
a piece of yellow wax with two slivers of what 
I think was bone thrust through it crosswise, 
and a small semblance of a snake, rudely carved 
out of wood. There was, too, some dust, or pow- 


368 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


der, that must once have been leaves, or perhaps 
roots. These unchancy things and the bag that 
held them I dropped into the fire, breathing a 
sigh of relief to see its red tooth seize upon them. 
The wax made a hissing noise, and the dust of 
leaves, or whatever it was, burned with a bright, 
fierce flame. 

Then with feverish haste I got the Hynds jew- 
els back into the buckskin bag. I had n’t the 
faintest notion as to their actual value, though 
I knew it must be considerable — enough to 
make up to Nicholas Jelnik the losses he had 
sustained ; enough to decide his fate — and mine. 
Even now he was packing to go ; even now there 
were “ For Sale ” signs on the gray cottage. 

I ran into our living-room, snatched my sewing- 
bag from the sewing-stand, and dropped the 
heavy bag into it. That looked more common- 
place. 

The clamor from the kitchen, incident upon 
Beautiful Dog’s having taken refuge under Mary 
Magdalen’s skirts, had died down. I knew that 
Beautiful Dog was licking his wounds after de- 
feat, and the Black cats, sedate and mild-man- 
nered, were licking their paws after victory. I 
determined that from that afternoon Beautiful 
Dog should become an honored and important 
institution in Hynds House. If I had to choose 
a new family escutcheon, I think I should insist 


HARBOR 


369 


upon having Beautiful Dog rampant upon it! 

When I went outside, the garden was a gray- 
green gloom of flying leaves and twisting tree- 
branches bending before the stiff northeast gale. 
It was wild weather — weather that sent the 
blood tingling through the veins and whipped 
red into one’s cheeks. 

I got into Mr. Jelnik’s grounds through the 
hedge behind the spring-house, and ran like a 
hare through his garden. I had to hammer upon 
his door before I could make Achmet hear me, 
so loud and surf-like was the noise of the wind 
in the trees. 

The Jinnee stepped back and salaamed, his 
hands upon his breast. Then he laid a finger 
upon his lips, for from up-stairs came the 
wailing outcry of a violin. 

The Jinnee looked thin and old. His gar- 
ments hung loose upon his shrunken frame. 
There was trouble in that house, he told me. 
The master had wished to send Daoud away. 
Daoud had refused to go. To leave one’s lord 
when calamity came upon him was to shame one’s 
beard. It was the act of the infidel, not 
the behavior of the faithful, and Daoud had 
threatened to shave his beard, put on the dress 
of a pilgrim, and beg his way from Hyndsville 
to Mecca. He was even now kneeling upon a 
prayer-mat reciting a four-bow prayer. As for 


370 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


the master, for two days he had not eaten; he 
merely swallowed a cup of coffee in the morn- 
ing because Achmet wept. This afternoon he 
had fled to his violin for relief. Verily, God was. 
afflicting them ! “ The bad fortune of the good 

turns his face to heaven, even as the good for- 
tune of the bad bends his head to the earth. It 
is the will of God: Islam!” said The Jinnee, 
simply. 

“ I must see Mr. Jelnik, now, this minute ! I 
have news for him,” I said hastily. 

The Jinnee looked doubtful. Plainly, he 
did n’t want his master disturbed, even by me. 
“ I have never seen him like this before,” he 
told me. “ Listen ! ” 

Came the cries of the violin, heart-rending 
cries of regret and despair, followed by furious 
protests ; then a nobler grief, and love, and long- 
ing. 

“ After a while it will pray for him. Then 
Satan the stoned, whom may God confound, will 
depart from him,” said Achmet. 

“ But in the meantime I must see him, imme- 
diately.” 

“ He goes to-morrow. That is why he is af- 
flicted to-day,” said The Jinnee. “ I think, ha- 
noum , he would go without seeing you again. 
It is a grievous thing to say to one’s beloved, 

< I leave you.’ I have said it. I was young 


HARBOR 


371 


then. I am old now, but I have not forgotten.” 

I unfastened the chain from my neck. A half- 
coin swung from it as a pendant. 

“ Place this in his hand. It is a sign. It has 
power to lay the evil spirit which troubles this 
house,” I told him gravely. 

He seized upon it with an eager hand. “ In 
the name of God ! ” said The Jinnee, and fairly 
flew out of the room. 

A minute later, his violin grasped in one hand, 
my chain in the other, Nicholas Jelnik appeared. 
His appearance shocked me. The mask was off ; 
here was stark and naked misery. 

“ Nicholas! ” I said, “ Nicholas! ” 

“ You should not have come ! ” he said roughly. 
“ Why have you come? I did not want you to 
see me — thus. Is it not enough for me to suf- 
fer? ” And he made an impatient, imploring 
gesture. His lips quivered. 

“ Put aside the violin, Ariel,” I said. “ But 
keep the coin.” 

He stiffened, as if he braced himself for fur- 
ther blows. But he laid aside the violin, and 
with a supreme effort of will got himself in hand. 
That early training in self-control worked a mir- 
acle now. Here was no longer the wild, white- 
lipped musician, but a pale, proud young man 
who faced me with stately politeness. 

“ I have another gift for you, Nicholas Jel- 


372 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


nik .” To save my life I could n’t keep my voice 
from shaking, my eyes from glittering, my cheeks 
from flaming. “ Do not go, old Jinnee. Stay 
and see what gift I bring the master.” 

Then it occurred to me that it would be dan- 
gerous should strange or greedy eyes look upon 
what my sewing-bag hid. The thought fright- 
ened me.” 

“ You are sure there is none to see? Achmet, 
there is no stranger around? ” 

“ We are alone,” said the black man, quietly. 
Both of them seemed astonished and concerned. 

Reassured, I drew forth the heavy buckskin 
bag and placed it in Nicholas Jelnik’s hands. 

“ From Hynds House — and me — and oh, 
Nicholas, from Beautiful Dog, too ! ” I said, and 
laughed and cried. 

For the moment he did n’t understand. He 
thought it some loving woman-foolishness of 
Sophy’s, some woman-gift she had made for him. 
I knew, for he gave me a glance of tenderness. 
And then he opened the bag, and staggered like 
a drunken man, and sank into the nearest chair, 
trembling like a leaf in the wind. The Hynds 
fortune had come back to the last of Richard’s 
blood. 

When the mist cleared from my eyes, I saw old 
Achmet on the floor, with his hands upraised 


HARBOR 


3T3 


and tears running down his black cheeks like 
rain, unashamedly and unaffectedly pouring out 
praises and thanksgivings to his Creator. 

“Hold out your skirts, Sophy !” cried Nich- 
olas J elnik, and poured the glittering things into 
my lap, boyishly. He was beautiful again, ra- 
diant and young-eyed as the choiring cherubim. 
There were two exquisite, pear-shaped ear-ring 
drops among the Hynds jewels, and these he 
took, threaded upon my chain on either side the 
broken coin, and hung around my neck. He held 
a ruby against my lip and turquoises near my 
eyes, and laughed. 

“ These for Hynds House, Sophy ! ” he cried, 
and laughed again to see my lips tremble. 
“ What? It is not these you want? Choose for 
yourself, then. I promised you the best of them, 
you know.” 

“ I want none of them,” I said. 

“No? Take them, then, Achmet, and put 
them away,” said Mr. Jelnik, in a matter-of-fact 
voice. “ You will guard them for me, for the 
time being. And tell Daoud I have changed my 
mind about sending him away. He can change 
his about shaving his beard, and save himself the 
trouble of begging his way to Mecca.” 

I stood up in silence, and held out my skirt 
apron-wise, while The Jinnee as silently removed 


374 


A WOMAN NAMED SMITH 


the Hynds jewels. Then he tied the buckskin 
bag, concealed it in a fold of his robe, and left 
the room. 

“ Now, Sophy,” said Mr. Jelnik, facing me, 
“ you offered Hynds House to me once, and I re- 
fused it because I did n’t have the price. I told 
you at the time that if ever I had the Hynds 
jewels in my possession, I might be tempted to 
make you an offer of exchange. I am going to 
make you an offer now. I should like to live in 
Hynds House, Sophy. I don’t think I could be 
happy anywhere else. You see, Sophy, I ’m go- 
ing to spend the rest of my life here in America, 
become an American citizen. Now, what about 
Hynds House? ” 

“ You may have it,” I said. 

“ At my own price? ” he demanded. 

“ At your own price. Did you think I would 
haggle with you? ” 

“ No. It ’s I who intend to haggle with you. 
I ’m going to make a tremendous bargain. 
There ’s something that must go with the house. 
Something that ’s worth more than all the 
Hyndses ever had in all their lives. You, Sophy. 
My sweetheart, come ! ” And he stood there 
shining-eyed, and held out his arms. 

“ Once I sent for you. Once I called you. 
And both times you came to me, Sophy. You 
came because you are mine. Come! ” said Nich- 


HARBOR 


375 


olas Jelnik. And the golden lights danced in 
and out of his eyes that were like brown mountain 
water when the sun is upon it, and his hair was 
like Absalom’s. 

In all Israel there was none to he so much 
praised as Absalom for his beauty ; from the sole 
of his foot to the crown of his head there was no 
blemish m him. 

And caught by the surge and power, as it were 
of the very wave of life itself, I was swept into 
those outstretched arms. 


THE END 







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